


Tau Stands for Time Constant

by whyamilike_this



Series: U-694verse [2]
Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: Abusive Relationship, Angst and Porn, But Morty's Kinda Into It, Control Issues, Emotional Grooming, Emotional Manipulation, Established Relationship, Extremely Dubious Consent, F/M, Possessive Rick, Rick is a Goddamn Predator, Rick is not a good guy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-04
Updated: 2019-11-25
Packaged: 2020-03-02 10:01:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 23
Words: 177,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18808909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whyamilike_this/pseuds/whyamilike_this
Summary: Morty didn’t have to be a genius to know that Rick hated it: keeping mom and Summer in the loop. And honestly she wasn’t entirely sure why he put up with it. Before (beforebefore), if they disappeared for days on end he couldn’t care less what people thought of it. He’d leave mom and… and everyone else to worry about them or not – though usually it wasnot.But ever since – since thingshad changedhe’d text someone around dinnertime with an update – he even had an alarm programmed onto his watch to remind him since it was rare that evening on earth coincided with the time table of whatever planet or dimension their adventures had taken them.And it was strange… strange to see Rick being so…conscientious.But in all that time, on all those adventures, Morty never realized how much Rick was playing along, how much it was forherbenefit, or how much taking away that small favor couldupend her entire life- not until the school field trip.(Or the one where Morty makes the slightly uncomfortable adjustment to living under Rick's thumb.)





	1. Chapter One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a continuation of U is for Ubiquitous and though technically it probably isn't a required read, it is _definitely_ a follow up to the events of that story.
> 
> =^･ｪ･^=

Morty didn’t have to be a genius to know that Rick hated it: keeping mom and Summer in the loop. And honestly she wasn’t entirely sure why he put up with it. Before ( _before_ before), if they disappeared for days on end he couldn’t care less what people thought of it. He’d leave mom and… and everyone else to worry about them or not – though usually it was _not._

But ever since – since things _had changed_ he’d text someone around dinnertime with an update – he even had an alarm programmed onto his watch to remind him since it was rare that evening on earth coincided with the time on whatever planet or dimension their adventures had taken them.

And it was strange… strange to see Rick being so… _conscientious_.

She’d gotten half a glimpse at his text chain with mom once and it was 90% lies but the fact that he was making an effort was _weird_. But a lot of things were weird with Rick so Morty didn’t spend too much time worrying about it; the less she tried to understand him, the happier she’d be.

But in all that time, on all those adventures, Morty never realized how much Rick was playing along, how much it was for _her_ benefit, or how much taking away that small favor could _upend her entire life_ \- not until the school field trip.

It was dumb. _So_ dumb. Just some lame camping trip to the woods upstate. But she’d wanted to taste the life of a normal teenager for _once_ ; sleep in bunk beds with classmates and see for herself what kind of pajamas Jessica wore to bed.

When Morty had carefully broached the subject over dinner, mom had (big surprise) left the decision up to Rick and he had refused point blank. Four days away from him – that would be a new record, one she knew he had no plans of breaking - so she was doomed the moment mom’s eyes had drifted to him for approval.

Morty would have given it up right then – she knew how it worked with Rick: he got what he wanted. No compromises, no complaining, no control. Rick ruled her universe and he was a mostly magnanimous god so it wasn’t all bad. Who else would drag her out to the edge of the galaxy just to watch asteroids shatter fragile, newly-formed planets made of ice? Who else knew so perfectly how to make _her_ shatter, two fingers pushed inside her and a palm over her mouth?

So Rick could have his way. There were obvious benefits in it for her.

But some small, stupid part of her brain had already fantasized what it might be like to go camping and it was hard not be a little disappointed.

_(maybe Jessica and her friends would stand near Morty while they waited for the bus, maybe that nice guy in biology who lent her a pencil once would joke with her again, maybe the whispers about ‘that weird Smith girl’ would quiet down once people saw she was really just a normal girl who could burn marshmallows and complain about hiking just like everyone else)_

Her disappointment must have shown on her face because Summer caught her eye. “Why can’t she go?” Summer asked around a bite of pasta. It was a new trend; Summer standing up for her both at school and at home, treating her nice when before ( _before_ before) she’d ignored her at best and ridiculed her at worst. Now, with that flat glare that demanded logic, Summer glanced between mom and Rick like she couldn’t imagine why they were even having the conversation.

Not for the first time, Morty marveled that her and Summer shared DNA. Then again, in theory Rick was (pretty much) a blood relative and there was no one in the multiverse more different from her than him so what the fuck did she know?

“I mi- _eeeeouh-_ ght need her for adventures, Summer,” Rick answered distractedly, tapping at his watch.

But his disinterested act didn’t fool Morty. She saw the way the corners of his eyes narrowed infinitesimally and she rushed to stammer, “It’s not – no biggie, Summer. It’ll probably be – you know it’ll probably be pretty lame, anyways…” but her words hit the table weak and flat.

Summer completely ignored Morty’s vocal belly-flop and put down her cup to properly level Rick with a glare, “It’s just a couple days. And grandpa, if you need help, _I’ll_ be around.”

Morty didn’t love that. _She_ was Rick’s sidekick – it was just about the only worthwhile thing she had going. What if Rick realized how much better suited Summer was for the job with her can do attitude and BAMF berserker mode?

But the part of Morty that pressed against that thick wall separating her from all the other kids at school wasn’t entirely opposed to the offer. Rick couldn’t completely replace her with Summer in four days, right? Probably. _Maybe_.

She should never have brought it up.

“What if we’ve got to deactivate a neutrino bomb, Summer?” Rick caught up Morty’s arm by the wrist and used his grip to brandish her limp hand over the table while Morty let her fork clatter onto the plate. “Morty’s freakishly tiny fingers are the only ones that can fit between a hydrogen reactor and its casing.”

“ _Okay_ \- but what are the odds of that _really_ coming up?” Summer asked, lifting an eyebrow and shooting Rick with a look that Morty would _never_ get away with.

“It’d only take one neutrino bomb to scatter our atoms across three galaxies, Sum-Sum,” he bit back, dropping Morty’s hand and stretching his arm out over the back of her chair. “Th- _aaaugh-_ at something you willing to risk?”

“I’m just saying, maybe some quality time with some kids her own age might be _good_ for Morty,” Summer said strongly and Morty just barely managed not to cringe. Rick _hated_ when people tried to tell him how to take care of her; it was a big sore spot under his hard shell and she felt it when his arm tensed behind her.

“Maybe a little break from adventuring would be good for her, dad,” mom chimed in and Morty _deeply_ regretted that she had ever thought bringing the camping trip up at dinner (like she was a normal high schooler and not, in fact, _Morty_ ) was a good idea. “She’s not the only one who can help, you know.”

Morty watched Rick reach mechanically for the flask in his breast pocket, his prominent adam’s apple bobbing three times before he twisted the cap back on. “I – _eeerrup_ \- don’t see what the big appeal about _the woods_ is anyways,” he scoffed. “Trees are an invasive species and if you want to sleep on the ground under the stars, I know _six_ planets where the soil is softer than a down quilt.”

Mom and Summer were staring at him and Morty knew he felt trapped – cornered into agreeing to let her go – and that she would pay for it later. Her thighs clenched uncontrollably in anticipation and that familiar surge of self-hatred washed through her like thick syrup, threatening to drown her. He shot her a glower, and she had to remind herself how to swallow.

“ _Fine_ Morty, if you want to go out and ge– _eeeugh-_ t poison oak and waste your time play-acting bullshit trust exercises with a gang of pheromone-addled teenagers, _go ahead_.”

His cool hand wrapped around the base of her neck and Morty tried to return mom’s smile but the hot press of tears in the back of her eyes was too strong.

Sure enough, Rick had portaled straight into her bedroom that night and woken her up by flipping her over and pressing her to the mattress with a heavy arm between her shoulder blades. “You shouldn’t have done that, Morty,” Rick taunted her, his body buried in her to the hilt while he pinned her wrists against her lower back with one hand and muffled her frantic moans with the other. His breath was hot in her ear. “I promise you’ll regret it.”

She’d barely turned the field trip permission slip in on time the next day but she’d made it under the cut.

Mr. Goldenfold looked almost as surprised as she did when he added her name to the roster and Morty told herself that she was being stupid. This was what she _wanted_. The pressing weight in the pit of her stomach argued that point but she vehemently ignored it. She was _allowed_ to want things. And Rick - well, Rick would just have to fucking deal with that.

But if she thought Rick’s slightly rougher treatment of her the night he signed her permission slip was the worst it was going to get, she was very much mistaken.

Rick disappeared the evening before Morty left. He didn’t say anything, he didn’t ask her along on some extended adventure (the way she’d figure he’d keep her from going – he _always_ got what he wanted), he didn’t text the family group chat saying he’d be back before dawn as had become the his new unspoken policy for leaving the house long enough to attract attention.

He just… left.

Morty didn’t think much of it. He was throwing a tantrum. He was probably getting wasted in some alien bar and he’d stumble home and pass out on the couch watching interdimensional cable. For a guy who got the senior discount at the movie theater, he was awfully childish.

But he was still a no-show come the next morning and Morty worried over the tight line of mom’s lips and the twitchy way her fingers drummed on her crossed arms as she waved Morty off from the doorstep. She wasn’t exactly discreet when her eyes darted between Morty and the empty space on the driveway reserved for Rick’s ship.

Morty’s hand fisted the pendant hanging at the hollow of her throat – the one Rick had made her – the habit a new nervous compulsion she tried not to think too hard about. Tension was what he wanted and she wouldn’t so easily play into his hands.

Plus it was surprisingly easy to forget about him once she was squeezed into the window seat next to _Jessica_ , who could have sat anywhere but chose to sit next to Morty instead. There was simply no room to worry about Rick when she was so preoccupied wondering how Jessica could smell so good literally _all the time_.

Morty didn’t smell that good – jeez, she considered herself lucky if she only smelled like sweat and not any of the noxious, chemical, exhaust, guts-and-gore smells she had grown used to picking up on adventures with Rick. That’s what he usually smelled like at least, well some combination of those things and something musky that was just _him_ and that – truth be told – Morty really didn’t hate.

But Jessica smelled like the nice stores in the mall that had half naked pictures of beautiful people on their walls and it made Morty’s stomach flop over uncomfortably.

The bus ride was great; Morty got to strain her ears while Jessica told her friend across the aisle about her most recent break-up with Brad; drama involving a girl from another school and Jessica’s half-wistful statements about a lack of chemistry. Morty was just glad she’d worn her jeans because she kept on needing to wipe her sweaty palms off on her thighs and by the time they’d completed the three hour drive, Morty had practically worn new white patches into the blue of the denim.

She managed to trail close behind Jessica as all the students gathered around an empty fire pit to get the welcome speech. And amazingly, _horrifically_ , the beautiful redhead turned to her when everyone was supposed to split into groups of four. Even if Tricia and Kari looked like they’d be happier with anyone else, Morty only had eyes for Jessica while she laughed and joked and bumped elbows with her while they wound their way through a rope obstacle course and did some lame nature themed scavenger hunt.

She was so preoccupied by Jessica that Rick didn’t take up too many of her thoughts until she collapsed onto the top corner mattress in a row of utilitarian bunk beds.

A lot of the girls were complaining that the clearly ancient (though notably unstained) mattresses disgusted them but Morty, who had come into contact with some _truly_ nasty things on her adventures with Rick, was more than happy to tuck herself into her sleeping bag and gaze longingly at the sliver of Jessica’s legs she could see between the two bunks separating them.

Jessica had a smattering of freckles above her knees and Morty briefly let herself imagine that she was the kind of person who might one day get to draw constellations across those marks. _Briefly_. Because that was impossible for about a hundred reasons and those sorts of daydreams – well sometimes those thoughts wound up hurting more than expected.

After a dark haired girl with glasses made some passing comment that the ‘Smith girl’ was staring, Morty turned over, staring at the dingy wall of the cabin and trying hard not to give into the impulse to check her phone.

If she did, she’d have to acknowledge the texts she’d been avoiding all day and she knew – _just knew_ – that the moment she did, the little break from her tumultuous home life would be _over_.

She might have ignored them all night - maybe even all the next day and the day after that - except that swirling black hole in her stomach never stopped reminding her that she was responsible for breaking up the family – that it was _her_ who… if it weren’t for her… that she had to hold herself _accountable_ for the path she’d put everyone on with her one foolish, distraught request and if that meant ruining her week of being a normal teenager with a boatload of crappy feelings… well that was _exactly_ what she deserved.

She sighed and unlocked her phone, trying not to look too long at the selfie she’d forced Rick to take with her that she’d set as her background.

_Mom: Any word from my dad? (3:32 pm)_

_Mom: He’s not answering any of my texts, you think he’s in trouble? (3:54 pm)_

_Mom: Hey Morty, sorry to keep bugging you on your big camping trip but think you can text your grandpa for me? I’m getting a little worried. (7:14 pm)_

_Mom: I’ve usually heard from him by now (7:30 pm)_

_Mom: Any word from him? (8:52 pm)_

Morty glared hard at her phone and sighed out long and low through her nose.

She hadn’t heard from Rick at all. That put the count at twenty-four hours of radio silence - a nearly unheard of feat since… since things had changed. Morty was fairly sure the odds were good that he’d gone on some kind of bender but he usually hit a certain level of intoxication ( _dangerous, brutal, and talkatively drunk_ ) where he’d portal to her location and drag her off with a hand wrapped around her upper arm. It hardly never took a full day of drinking and drugs to reach that point – her best guess was the average was somewhere between twelve to sixteen hours – and more than a niggling in the back of her brain had been _positive_ that he would have showed up and dragged her off on some ‘important’ mission by now. That he hadn’t was wrapping Morty up in a variety of emotions she didn’t really want to be feeling and actively ignored.

Instead she did her best to remind herself that Rick was the most dangerous man in most rooms, even if he was belligerently drunk, and so the odds of him lying dead in a ditch somewhere weren’t high. Probably.

Still she glared dimly through her phone for a solid two minutes, the cursor blinking in the text chain with Rick before she pulled her mom’s number back up and typed out ‘ _Haven’t heard from him, sorry bad reception_ ’ before she turned her phone off and shoved it under her pillow.

The soft chattering amongst the more talkative girls slowly wound down and eventually someone flicked the lights off, casting the room into shadows.

In the dark, Morty could more clearly make out the soft glow of her necklace and her hand lifted to fiddle with it on reflex, her chin tilting to study the delicate cluster of stars. She’d long ago learned to sleep with her fist wrapped around it; originally an attempt to dampen the warm light it always emitted but now the shape of it pressing into her palm was comforting.

She’d had to adapt to the light; the chain wasn’t cinched with a clasp nor was it long enough to pull over her head. There was no way to take it off (though, to be fair, Morty hadn’t tried particularly hard) and she hadn’t dared to ask Rick why his strangely beautiful gift came with that caveat.

Then again, she had a pretty good guess about that already and it wasn’t completely unrelated to the silver chain and gemstone she still wore around her wrist.

 _That_ gift, of course, she could take off. She just chose not to. Rick’s on the other hand… well despite how much she cherished the idea that _Rick_ had gone out of his way to make her something special, she might sleep a little easier if her chest wasn’t lit up all night long like she was E. _fucking_ T.

She pointedly unwound her fingers from around it and tucked the necklace back under her sleep shirt, glancing around the room.

It had been a while since she’d gone to sleep alone. Not that now, in a room filled with the soft sleepy murmurs of her classmates, she was _technically_ alone. Though it was strange how in the midst of the closest thing Morty had ever gotten to a sleepover, she’d never felt more alone. But what did she have in common with the girls asleep in those bunks? Age, gender, and hometown? How many of her classmates had left the _state_ let alone the galaxy? Their weekends were spent at ice cream shops and movie theaters, not alien coups and seedy intergalactic drug deals.

Most of these girls had probably never even held a gun let alone taken a life.

Morty purposely shook herself out of that well tread vein of thoughts. Her life was different. It was _better_. For the most part. Or at least, better or worse, she wouldn’t trade it for a goddamn thing. And Rick was all the friend she needed anyways.

From the slow settling stillness and the thickening sounds of breathing, Morty could tell most of her classmates had drifted off peacefully. Now if only she could turn off her stupid brain and do the same. But she was so programmed to run on a different schedule, her body was reluctant to obey.

After all, most of her nights were interrupted by either an adventure or Rick’s insatiable lust (she could never tell which she liked more). And when she finally got to throw herself in bed, exhausted from one thing or the other, it was usually with Rick’s bony arms around her. At worst he’d stumble into her room blackout drunk a few hours after she’d started to doze only to drape himself across her haphazardly before checking out with a resounding chorus of snores.

That was when Morty liked him best. Well, _no_ \- that wasn’t entirely true; she’d be full of shit if she said she didn’t love when his eyes lit up like a spark in the dark, some wild idea burning through him like a lightning bolt. Or when that belly deep laugh that he hardly ever shared with anyone besides her burst out of him unbidden, that was pretty nice too. Not to mention the few times something almost _soft_ would slip across his feature and melt decades off his face to reveal someone terrifyingly vulnerable before he slammed the door closed again, usually with a burp or a fart or a cutting insult.

Those… well those were a mixed bag.

But when he slept with her ( _actually_ slept with her, not the other thing), that was when it was easiest to believe that he loved her back. When his mouth stopped shaping cruel words, and the weight of him on top of her was indifferent if not gentle, it was easier to pretend that the unconscious way he wrapped himself around her was real and actual affection and not some warped version of… something else, something Morty didn’t have a name for, something that almost felt like love except it was pulling her under and if she didn’t swim for the surface soon she’d drown in it.

Yeah, Rick was nice when he was asleep. Even as bony and irritable as he was, he was a surprisingly decent cuddler.

Maybe it was that thought (or the strange melancholy that followed it) but alone in her borrowed sleeping bag, it took her entirely too long to fall asleep.

When she woke up the next morning and turned her phone back on, it was to a barrage of progressively poorly spelled texts from her mother and one very concise message from Summer.

 _Summer: Any word from Grandpa Rick? Mom’s a mess_ _(7:32am)_

The idea that _Summer_ was starting to worry kind of soured the fact that Jessica wore matching silky shorts-and-camisole pajama sets to bed.

But Morty _hadn’t_ heard from Rick. Of course she hadn’t, they were in the middle of some elaborate mind-game except he never bothered telling her the fucking rules.

Worst thing was she knew what he wanted, or at least knew enough to guess: He wanted her to text him and ask where he was – except it wasn’t just that. He wanted her to apologize for wanting to go on the camping trip, he wanted her to beg him to come back and pick her up and take her home. He wanted her to tell him how much she missed him and how boring everyone else was compared to him.

But she didn’t want to admit to any of that! She wanted to be a normal high school girl for _one goddamn week_ and roast marshmallows until they burned and lust after her crush from a slightly more intimate distance. Was that really so much to ask?

What she hated most of all was that some of what he wanted her to tell him was true. She _did_ miss Rick and his stupid jokes and that crooked, sincere smile he only showed her and the reassuring weight of him dipping the mattress while she drifted off to sleep. And _yeah_ Tricia’s bitching about mosquito bites and Kari’s refusal to do any of the heavy lifting and Brad’s endless tirade of self-complimentary bullshit was boring her to fucking tears but it was the kind of ordinary she needed every once in a while.

And she had earned at least that much! Every other second of her life she was at Rick’s disposal. She’d long ago given up complaining when he pulled her out of class in the middle of a lesson. She’d bend over backwards for him (she _literally_ had on one noteworthy occasion and had the scars from spinal surgery to prove it), and she never asked for _anything_ in return.

Rick could let her have _one_ field trip.

So she didn’t text him. She didn’t apologize. She didn’t beg him to take her home. She let the school bus do it at the end of the four days and three nights despite the increasingly urgent texts from her mother and the two terse phone calls where she lied through her teeth and said Rick hadn’t responded to her calls or messages either.

She felt pretty good about it, felt like she was _finally_ standing up for herself - until she was left at the curb outside the gymnasium in the pounding rain, the rest of her classmates already picked up and carted off until it was only her trying to find shelter under the thin doorway awning. Cold water slipped down her neck and plastered her hair to her face and she was freezing, her teeth chattering uncontrollably with the chill. She wanted to crawl under her covers and sleep until she woke up someone different; someone who wasn’t so easily forgotten, but that fantasy was hard to play out when every muscle in her body was bunched with cold.

She took out her phone and her fingers automatically pulled up her text chain with Rick. If he were around, he would have remembered to pick her up. He might show up drunk (like her mother undoubtedly was) but he’d be excited to see her – or well, the Rick version of excited. It was mostly indicated by the small jerk he did to attention and the careful, calculated change in his features from bored to slightly-less-bored.

But Rick’s absence was the whole problem and she wasn’t quite ready to fold under yet, not when she was still high off of Jessica’s hug goodbye. So she texted mom, the fat raindrops splattering her screen making the task a little more difficult.

After five minutes without a response, she tried calling even though she _hated_ speaking on the phone, her stutter somehow always so much worse when she couldn’t gauge expressions. Not that it mattered; mom didn’t answer. Five more minutes, another few texts, another call. No answer. They didn’t have a house phone anymore – they’d gotten rid of it shorty after… Only one person had ever used it anyways and he was _gone_ – so if mom’s phone was on silent or lost in the couch or she was just too drunk to notice the ringing, Morty was screwed.

She considered walking home but she had an idea of what might be waiting for her there and she decided being pelted with freezing rain was easier to cope with. Mom was clearly in the middle of some kind of breakdown and it was unquestionably Morty’s fault. And everyone _had_ to know that; mom and Summer were smart enough to put that sort of stuff together. Better to just catch pneumonia or TB or whatever the fuck old-timey people always caught in the boring books she never read for lit class than face the accusatory eyes of her mother.

It was Summer who called her after nearly an hour out in the rain, her voice a little frantic when she demanded, “Morty, where are you? Didn’t your field trip end today?”

“Uh yeah, I’m still – I’m waiting for mom to pick me up…”

Summer breathed out a sigh and Morty could hear the way her sister’s voice hitched as she jogged down stairs. “Jeezus Morty, you shoulda just called me,” she grumbled and Morty wasn’t sure (as she never was with this new, friendlier Summer) if the obvious frustration in her voice was actual anger or friendly sibling ribbing.

“Jeez, Summer, I just – I thought you might be busy,” Morty tentatively admitted and she could practically hear Summer’s eye-roll through the phone.

“I’ll be there soon,” she snapped and hung up without a goodbye leaving Morty _positive_ that Summer at least knew who to blame Rick’s absence on.

It was nearly another thirty minutes before Summer pulled up to the curb in mom’s sedan even though the school was only a five minute drive from home. Morty sidestepped the spray of water the wheels kicked up – somewhat uselessly really, she was pretty thoroughly drenched – and she had to pry her frozen fingers from their death-clench around her pendant to open the passenger side door. She tried valiantly to unstick her wet bangs from her forehead while she stared wide-eyed at her older sister across the center console and buckled herself in, half expecting Summer to start berating her right there and then.

But Summer looked too exhausted for that, her eyes dim and worried in a way she didn’t usually show, and even though she rustled Morty’s hair and shot her that vaguely pitying smile Morty had recently adapted to, it was strange to see her so flagged.

“Sorry for making you wait, Morty,” Summer hummed, turning the dial to amp up the heat when she caught on to Morty’s shivering and Morty was devastatingly, _achingly_ grateful for that small kindness when she felt like she deserved nothing of the sort. “Mom-” she cut herself off to roll her eyes, “-when she caught me leaving, she suddenly decided she wanted to take the car out to look for Rick. She tried to take the keys.” Morty watched a muscle tense in Summer’s jaw. “She was _totally wasted,_ ” she added, grumbling under her breath.

“No – Still no sign of Rick, huh?” Morty asked even though she already knew the answer and the grim frown her sister wore was like a heavy stone in Morty’s stomach sinking her down below murky waters _._

“Nope,” Summer sighed, snapping the ‘p’.

“Oh,” Morty breathed, knowing (and hating) that it was all her fault.

Like she had read her mind, Summer turned to her and made a face that was almost reassuring. Morty forced herself to smile back. “He’ll turn up Morty, don’t worry.”

“Yeah,” Morty agreed. “Sure,” but unlike her sister, she knew there was a price to be paid.

When they pulled into the driveway, Summer’s fingers darted to the clicker clipped to the sun visor but after half a moment’s pause, she lowered her hand. They both stared at the still-closed garage door for a tense second before Summer turned off the car with a hard jerk of her wrist, grabbed Morty’s soaked, rolled-up sleeping bag and dashed through the rain to the front door without another word to her sister.

Once Morty’s frantic, too-heavy breathing had fogged up an even coat over the windows, she followed at a much more reluctant pace.

“Mom?” Morty called out, dropping her wet backpack stuffed with dirty clothes in the foyer and peering anxiously into the dining room. It was dark in the house, none of the lights turned on even though the rainy gloom filtering through the windows didn’t do much to brighten the atmosphere.

The faint thumping of bass throbbed down the stairs and Morty grimaced at her soggy reflection in the foyer mirror. Music therapy. It was Summer’s favorite way of coping, or maybe dissociating – Morty couldn’t quite tell which - but whatever it was, it was an easy indicator that her sister was down for the count.

After nearly four days alone with whatever state mom was in, Morty couldn’t exactly blame her.

Speaking of which, she found mom in the kitchen, topping off an already mostly full glass of wine with a shaky hand. She turned fractionally towards Morty when she walked through the door and Morty caught sight of her cell phone clasped tightly in the hand steading the stem of the glass.

So she’d had her phone on her. She’d _chosen_ not to pick up or text back.

Morty had thought she was prepared for whatever thorns her mother had grown in Rick’s absence but it still _stung_ to piece that puzzle together.

“Oh h – hey mom,” Morty choked out, her voice cracking. She wasn’t dumb enough to ask how she was; it was obvious from the deep circles under her eyes, the stains on her shirt, and the knots in her hair that the answer wouldn’t be anything good. But still, the woman hadn’t acknowledged her more than that first slight turn in her direction. After a moment of quiet panic, Morty settled on practically whispering, “I – I’m back.”

Mom’s eyes were glued to her glass of wine. There was a slight slur to her voice when she asked, “Heard anything from my dad?”

A month before, Morty had been out on an adventure with Rick when things had gone south and two separate crime syndicates had started shooting at them. She’d been covering Rick’s back, firing a semi-automatic laser rifle into a crowd of creatures and screaming from fear and adrenaline when she saw the alien with a gun. She had no idea if _she_ was the target or if Rick was and she _knew_ from experience that she wouldn’t be able to spin the heavy, jittering rifle in her arms to get the shooter in time. Without thinking, she shifted the half step over to block Rick’s back and took the shot in her stomach.

The look mom was sweeping her with right now - hazel eyes cold and bitter and filled with the sort of resentment that _couldn’t_ have built up only in the last four days - felt a lot like that shot to the gut.

“No,” Morty breathed out, eyes dropping to the tiles while they burned with held back tears. Her hands jumped to her stomach, just like they had that sunny morning she’d been shot, and when she pulled them back she was surprised to find they didn’t come away bloody. But of course they wouldn’t be. She hadn’t _actually_ been hurt.

But in so many ways, this was much _much_ worse. No amount of synthetic skin could patch over her mother’s hatred.

“Well, be sure to tell me if you do,” mom commanded before she turned and disappeared into the garage. Morty caught one last glance of her back as she studied the clutter of Rick’s worktable - no doubt taking a visual inventory of his possessions and trying to determine whether he’d _left_ again – before the door closed and Morty was alone, shivering and dripping water onto the tile floor.

So mom _definitely_ knew it was all Morty’s fault Rick was missing. She’d put it all together, she’d _finally_ figured out Morty had learned the moment Rick had caught her up in his liquid nitrogen eyes nearly two years ago: _Rick_ was in charge. Questioning him was sacrilege. And Mom wouldn’t be making that mistake again anytime soon.

Morty clenched her fists and bit down on her lip until the new wave of tears faded.

She didn’t _get_ to feel sorry for herself. This was her fault. Rick’s disappearance, the tight lines around Summer’s eyes, dad’s… ( _nope_ , _don’t think about that_ )… for leaving mom with no one to depend on but her sociopathic father. It was all her fault and she felt the weight of that unutterable secret like it would be a relief to lay down in the road and let rush hour traffic drive right over her.

Morty had to bring him back home. It was the only thing that would keep her mother from spiraling, the last chance for Summer to be a _teenager_ before neglect forced her into adulthood too soon, the only thing that would loosen the noose of self-hatred she’d tied around her own throat.

But Morty would be in pretty serious trouble; no doubt about that. He’d wanted her to come groveling back to him at the first _whisper_ of his disappearance and if she had, she might have gotten off with only a teary, heartfelt apology and a few days of extra special attention.

But now – now she was _screwed._ He would be _furious_ it had taken her this long to realize her mistake and he’d make her pay for every day she’d ignored him.

Even knowing that it was inevitable, that she _had_ to grovel and accept whatever he had in mind with as much dignity as she could muster up, fear and anticipation urged her to put it off, just a _little_ bit longer.

She set to work on the neglected chores around the house. The sink and surrounding counters were piled high with dishes; plates covered in half-congealed and mostly uneaten meals, pots filled with the burnt remains of something unrecognizable (mom had probably fallen asleep in the middle of cooking, it used to happen all the time), glasses rimmed with the faint red ghost of wine. Almost every cup from the cupboard had been dirtied and Morty fished out the shattered remains of two broken wine glasses from underneath a chipped plate.

She cooked dinner. Nothing terribly complicated – the things she’d gotten better at cooking were all recipes she usually cooked with Rick and she didn’t want to trigger anyone so she stuck to the simple food she’d cooked for herself before he walked into their lives and mom had made family dinners _a thing_.

Morty was too anxious to knock on the door of the garage and tell her mother in person so she sent a text to the family chain, all too aware that Rick was a part of it and that the last several texts had been increasingly desperate pleas made by her mother to the absent man.

A few minutes later Summer came down the stairs and glanced around at the significantly cleaner kitchen, helping herself to a bowl of the prepared boxed mac and cheese Morty had thrown together.

“You know,” Summer muttered around a mouthful of noodles, “You didn’t have to do all that.” She tilted her chin towards the sink and Morty tried her best to make her smile look sincere.

“Nah it’s – it really wasn’t much,” she said with a shrug she didn’t feel.

“Morty-” Summer sighed and her bowl landed heavily on the counter, both her hands wrapped around it. A breath huffed out of Summer almost like a laugh except infinitely more empty. “Don’t take it to heart, okay Morty? She’s…” She trailed off and Morty had the impression that she was editing whatever she had originally intended to say. She finally settled on, “Mom’s not the greatest role model, huh?”

Morty almost snorted at that. “She’s just -” Morty cut herself off when words wouldn’t form themselves in her mouth. “Guess not,” she finally settled on and the two of them finished their meal in silence.

When mom still hadn’t left the garage an hour after Morty washed up her and Summer’s bowls, she packed away the leftovers and put the Tupperware in the fridge. She texted the group one last time:

_Morty: leftovers in the fridge if anyone gets hungry ;) (8:49 pm)_

Then she climbed up the stairs, her feet almost too heavy to lift.

She hadn’t changed out of her wet clothes - had barely noticed how uncomfortable her jeans felt still damp around the seams when every nerve ending in her body was prickling with anxiety. Now that she could feel something else besides guilt, she realized how cold and uncomfortable she was, but it was what she deserved for breaking her mother’s heart and her sister’s spirit so she threw herself face down on her bed and listened carefully for the pad of feet on the stairs.

Despite how much her stomach was twisted into knots, she managed to drift off into a half-doze. She was woken up by the soft sound of sobbing through the thin wall separating her bedroom from the room her mother now slept in alone. And the part of Morty that was bone-tired in a way that seemed too deeply ingrained for her sixteen-year-old body wondered what would happen if she just turned on the sound barrier, crawled back into bed, and went to sleep.

But that wasn’t an option. She’d already poked the bear, she didn’t need to set it on fire too.

With a prickle up her spine that was traitorously _not_ dread, Morty let herself out of her room and padded quietly down the stairs. She was now a master of sneaking around the darkened house and her foot skipped the squeaky second step without conscious thought. She navigated the midnight gloom with half her mind on staying silent; the other half ran over what sort of punishment Rick might have planned.

The very first time Rick had disciplined her, he’d strapped her to his worktable and pumped her full of nanobots. At the time, the injection and subsequent grafting had been _excruciating_ (not to mention her utter mortification when Rick, of all people, discovered she had a perverted streak, particularly set off by Rick’s naturally domineering nature) but since then she had to admit his tech had come in handy. When she’d been shot, the nanobots had immediately set to work altering the chemicals in her brain to provide some natural painkillers and started knitting up the organs that had taken the worst of the blast so that brief stretch of agony had paid off.

Besides, after the new, strange pain of nanobots fusing to her spinal cord faded to a natural high, he’d fingered her and eaten her out and pretty much blown her mind with pleasure so mostly the memory was a good one.

Morty glanced at her chipped, teal-painted fingernails and licked her lips. Okay, maybe the memory was a _really_ good one.

Since then he’d pushed her in just about every way she could imagine and some she couldn’t. The last time she’d given him cause to discipline her, he’d locked a vibrator against her clit under her hated chastity belt and sent her off to school, the device set low enough to keep her constantly keyed up but nowhere near enough to push her over the edge and no way to stop the vibration or get herself off. And all that was just because one of her classmates had texted her an unsolicited dick pic, probably on a dare.

So yeah, he had mastered a fucked up balance between expressing his displeasure and then reminding her exactly why she was so wrapped around his finger. But she could already tell this situation was shaping up to be _different_.

Morty carefully opened the door to the garage and braced the wood behind her, closing it gently and releasing the knob with absurd caution. Her mother was likely to come pounding down the stairs at the slightest hint of a sound from Rick’s workshop so Morty knew to be extra careful. She flicked on the light, squinting at the brightness after the pitch black house and frowning at the faint hum of the bulb, raucously loud in the tense silence.

The same mess of cables Morty had last caught Rick working on was still centered on his worktable and the surface was just beginning to amass the slightest amount of dust. The whole room smelled like Rick; like hot metal and electricity and oil and ozone and alcohol. There was absolutely no reason for a spiral of arousal to shoot through Morty at the mix of scents but it did and she clenched her legs seeking friction. Her fingers toyed with the pendant at her throat while her cheeks burned.

He’d _really_ fucked her up.

She pulled her phone out of her back pocket but she didn’t quite have the nerve to call him; her hands were already shaking and she was sure her stuttering would be mortifyingly worse than normal. And it was rare – usually emergencies only – that she spoke to Rick through the phone. It wasn’t often they were far enough apart to warrant the need. The thought of stuttering and pausing and dragging out her words and wasting his time was enough to send her heart racing. So she pulled up the text chain she shared with him instead.

She was always careful of what she put in their messages. She wasn’t _a complete_ idiot, she knew that even if she was over the age of consent in her state, what Rick was doing was hardly _legal_. Or ethical. And the last thing she wanted to do was send him to prison because she’s been too stupid to know that Big Brother was watching or whatever. So she kept their texting pretty tame.

She frowned down at her phone.

_Morty: Hey Rick!_

She squinted her eyes shut hard before glaring at her phone screen through the colors swirling across her eyes. She angrily erased the exclamation point. It gave off the wrong vibe.

_Morty: Hey Rick, I’m back from the field trip._

Yeah, that was okay. Factual. To the point.

_Morty: Hey Rick, I’m back from the field trip. I………._

Fuck this was hard. She dragged the pendant back and forth on its chain and listened to the buzz of metal against metal.

_Morty: Hey Rick, I’m back from the field trip. You were right, you always are._

Morty seated herself heavily in Rick’s swivel chair and her knee started bouncing automatically.

_Morty: It was totally lame. I would have had way more fun with you._

Was that even true?

Well, yeah, she almost certainly would have had more fun with Rick on an adventure. They got into some seriously crazy stuff, _amazing_ stuff, stuff that changed the way she looked at _everything_. But camping hadn’t been lame. It had been… It had been _okay_. It would have been better if she wasn’t fielding texts from mom the whole time. Rick’s absence had worn at Morty’s conscience like a mosquito bite but being a normal kid for just a little while had felt… kinda nice. Maybe. Whatever.

She sent the message off, positive it wasn’t going to even _begin_ to scratch the surface but she was desperate to start the cycle.

_Morty: I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you Rick. I miss you. Mom and Summer miss you too. And I know you’re mad at me but I’ll make it up to you. Just tell me what to do, Rick. Please._

She exhaled a shaky sigh while her finger hovered over the send button. Then she closed her eyes and sent it off into the multiverse.

She set her phone down face up on the desk and stared avidly at their text chain, waiting for the typing ellipses to show up but eventually her phone dimmed and went black without a sign of Rick’s response.

Her fingernails found their way to her teeth – she had learned not to bite them in an attempt to keep the teal nail polish permanently affixed to her fingers in better shape but right then it was impossible to resist the temptation. Rick usually painted them about once a week. Even blackout drunk, he did a better job at it than Morty could ever manage.

She studied the ragged edges, wondering if Rick was going to give her a hard time over how chipped and uneven they’d gotten over the course of camping. He probably would. He gave her a hard time over _everything_.

Her mind had just barely started to drift when the mechanical sound of a latch opening nearly startled Morty out of her skin. She jerked to her feet, glaring around the garage to find the source of the noise but was immediately distracted when her phone chimed and lit up.

She dove for it.

A message. One word.

_Rick: Bunker. (12:47 am)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm diving back into this story apparently, this time from Morty's perspective so we'll get a little taste of the other side of things. I _intended_ for this to be a quick thing - mostly smut, maybe a few chapters - but somehow... (≖ ‸ ≖ ✿) ...it has grown. 
> 
> Heed the angst and porn tag, that pretty much describes it perfectly. Morty _is_ a teenager after all. A horny, angsty teenager.


	2. Chapter Two

Morty gulped audibly in the silence of the garage. The bunker door was propped opened. That had been the noise, that strange metallic/mechanical _clunk_ that had shaken her out of her daydream.

Was Rick down there right now? _Holy shit_. What if he was down there, waiting for her? She had told herself she was ready to face his fury but now that confidence was a distant memory.

She clutched her phone to her chest as she ambled towards the tented rug concealing the hatch of Rick’s bunker. They didn’t spend a lot of time down there; it was generally where he worked on the projects mom or Summer or _the neighborhood_ would find too disturbing to silently abide. It was also where he interrogated ( _tortured_ ) prisoners and it was that thought that kept circling the drain of her mind as she flipped the rug over.

It took some effort to heft the trapdoor the rest of the way up revealing a ladder that disappeared into the darkness ominously. Almost as if the room had sensed her thoughts, a bluish-green light flickered on with a fluorescent hum below and Morty sucked in a deep breath before she reached for the first cold rung. She didn’t _quite_ have the nerve to close the hatch above her, unreasonably comforted by the warm light of the garage filtering through the hole as she descended into the secret sub-basement.

The first thing she noticed was Rick’s conspicuous absence. She’d never spoken the words out loud because Rick would tear her a new one but she could _feel_ him the moment he entered a room. It wasn’t logical or scientific and he would almost certainly rib her for being over-sentimental but it was true. She could be dead asleep or bored out of her mind in class or tied up in some rich-Rick’s harem and a shiver would raise the hair on the back of her neck – she’d glance up and he’d be there, stumbling through a portal or peering at her through the window of her classroom door or careening into a gilded room with fury written across his face in bold font.

So she knew it the second her feet hit the metal floor. Rick wasn’t there.

The _second_ thing she noticed was the collar.

The room was lined with blinking buttons and glowing fluids bubbling in vials and a big digital display frozen at _98:57:32_ in big red numerals hung from the wall but the only light truly working to banish the darkness was the florescent fixture over Rick’s work table, barren except for the one scrap of metal.

It was an intimidating piece of science – one she’d never seen before. She padded closer on trembling legs to get a better look at it, fatalistically aware of what the appearance of a collar likely meant for her and uncomfortably self-conscious over the fact that she recognized it for what it was at a glance, from across a room, _in the dark_. Her cheeks burned and she hated herself deeply for the sinking in her stomach, for the delicious throb of heat that pooled between her thighs.

He had her fucking number. And she hated it. Except fuck, she really _really_ didn’t.

Upon closer inspection, she realized the circle of metal was actually two pieces hinged together, the open ends displaying an impressive array of teeth that likely locked together to close the loop. The metal was two inches high and made of the same repurposed silver that Rick favored with his inventions. A few small lights glinted next to the open clasp; one solid green and the other blinking yellow.

Morty swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry.

She glanced at her phone hoping for some sort of guidance; a text from Rick telling her what she was supposed to do, except she already kind of knew what he wanted from her and she hated how much she wanted it too.

She tried to wipe her sweaty palms on her jeans, the fabric still a little damp from the rain, but the gesture was more compulsion than anything else. She couldn’t take her eyes off the collar, its green and yellow lights almost cheery in the dimness.

One last time, Morty asked herself if this was a good idea. There was nothing stopping her from climbing up the ladder, closing the hatch, creeping back into her bedroom and falling asleep. She didn’t _have_ to do everything Rick wanted her to – she was her own fucking person. With free will and everything.

Except her mother was probably still crying. Summer was probably wide awake blasting music through her ear buds and staring angrily at the ceiling. And… and this is what she’d agreed to when she’d made the trade. She’d asked him to… _she’d practically begged_ _him_ to…….

She’d picked _Rick_ and if she gave up on him now, it would have been for nothing.

She set her phone down face-up on the counter and silently willed Rick to text her with more detailed instructions before she fucked something up inadvertently. When a solid minute of desperate staring didn’t prompt a message, she reached out two trembling hands and lifted the device.

It was heavier than she thought it would be. _Of course_ it was heavier than she thought it would be. The metal was cool to the touch and Morty felt a shiver wrack her body that had nothing to do with the cold. She experimentally fiddled with the two halves, testing the hinge, studying the minute details and mapping out its shape, careful not to close the mechanism in case she accidentally locked it and she was left with no way to assuage Rick’s anger.

Once she’d determined the flashing lights were likely meant to sit at the front of her throat, the hinge on one side of her neck, the locking teeth on the other, Morty tentatively swept her hair over one shoulder.

The back half curved along the base of her skull so perfectly she knew with startling clarity that the band had been shaped to fit her. _Rick had made this just for her_. Heat pooled between her legs and she strangled the moan trying to claw its way up her throat.

With a trembling hand, she pulled her hair free and bit down hard on her lower lip. Submitting to Rick was always a dangerous idea. He was unstable, tenfold so when he was mad and she could feel his anger even now, alone in his dark bunker with his collar wrapped halfway around her neck. He wanted to punish her and locking herself in this thing was inviting whatever form that punishment took.

She shifted her weight, her thighs unconsciously clenching at the thought.

She trusted Rick. _Mostly_. She’d seen him beat down aliens twice his size with nothing but his fists and a maniacal smile but never once had he used those hands to hurt her worse than a spanking (and even then she _knew_ he was holding back, knew he could break her under his hand and bring her to tears with a single blow but he never did, not once, not ever).

In his own warped way he took care of her. Cherished her even, maybe.

He was the only person in the world who did.

So if this collar would get him back, bring him home, stop her mother’s tears and her sister’s loud, sad music; if seeing her collared would drag his sorry ass back where he could wrap his arms around her and give her that too-soft-to-be-Rick-Sanchez look, Morty could handle that.

Before she could second guess herself much more, she closed the loop, snapping the edges together until they clicked and whirred satisfyingly. It beeped twice in a content kind of way and when Morty tested the hold, running her fingers over the smooth seam where there used to be a split and trying to yank it back open, it held together like the thing had never been two separate pieces.

The collar had been heavy in her hands and the metal was an unmistakable weight around her neck. It sat right above the hollow of her throat, tight enough that she couldn’t wiggle more than a finger underneath before she’d feel the uncomfortable press against her throat. Despite how long she’d held it in her hands, the metal was still cool – or maybe that was just in comparison to her skin overheating as she flushed – and Morty was reminded of Rick’s cold fingers looped around her throat, owning her, _controlling_ her, and the breath that left Morty sounded like an embarrassingly desperate pant even to her own ears.

Her lip was back between her teeth again and Morty closed her eyes, savoring the feeling of _belonging_ to Rick. She’d have to wait for _him_ to take the collar off. She was ( _as she always was_ ) completely at his mercy. Her hands slid over the metal and she tried to imagine what she looked like. Probably ridiculous. In her wrinkled yellow t-shirt and dirty jeans, the metal band around her neck would be a strange anachronism. And if she climbed up the ladder, if Rick didn’t come back by tomorrow morning and Summer or mom saw her with the blinking hunk of metal wrapped around her throat, Morty would be so _so_ mortified.

A strange excited shiver raced up her back at the thought.

She’d have to explain that she found some random collar in Rick’s workshop and locked it onto herself in the hopes that he’d come back to take it off of her. But her mom and sister were smart enough that some string of suspicion would remain. And the thought that they might find out about her fetish, the chance they might put together how much Morty _liked_ being tied up and held down and pried open to be vulnerable to whatever Rick wanted from her – that was too much embarrassment to bear.

A metallic latching _thunk_ broke the silence and Morty jerked, her eyes popping open as her fantasies crashed to a halt.

She half-expected to find Rick standing in front of her, glowering down at her with dilated eyes, the back of his hand dragging over his wet bottom lip. But she was still alone in the semi-dark bunker, no static charge zinging up her spine to indicate his presence.

Morty glanced around, suddenly very wary of what had made the noise or what might be lurking in the shadows but her careful scan didn’t turn up anything of note until she realized how much deeper the shadows around the edges of the room were and she tilted her head up.

The hatch door she’d very purposely left open had swung closed, cutting off the bunker from the warm light of the garage. A little breath left her in an almost silent gasp and she scurried up the ladder, wrapping her fingers around the lever and tugging.

It wouldn’t budge.

Morty felt her heartrate spike as desperation urged her to try again. Of course she didn’t want mom or Summer to see her with Rick’s fucking collar around her neck but _no way_ did she want to wait for him to show up down in the bunker! It was creepy! And it was where he kept the things he wanted to hide away. The thought that she might have become one of those things terrified her in a way that shouldn’t have been setting off sparks behind her eyes but since when had her head and her genitals been on the same page?

After a solid minute of useless yanking, pushing, and pounding, she rested her hot face against the metal rung of the ladder and accepted what she’d suspected the moment she realized the door had slammed closed: Rick had locked her in.

Okay. _Okay._ There was a solution to this problem; that was how Rick worked. She didn’t know what it was yet but she might be able to figure it out.

She climbed down the ladder and seated herself heavily on the stool in front of his work table. A glance at her phone told her he hadn’t texted her any new instructions so she was on her own.

This was a game he liked to play sometimes when she had done something particularly stupid. He’d make her find her own punishment and work out on her own what she’d done to upset him. It was a potent form of torture for Morty because she almost _never_ got it right on the first attempt and floundering around without his instructions was excruciating after nearly two years of having her life reduced to the simplicity of doing exactly what she was told the moment he spoke the order.

She pulled up the text chain with Rick and thought hard about what he might want from her. She was tapping her heel against the floor, her knee shaking with the movement as she fought the urge to clamp her thumbnail between her teeth.

Her screen dimmed and then darkened again and Morty frowned at her own anxious face reflected back at her on the black screen, her eyes darting traitorously to the band of metal circling her neck.

Oh. _Oh._ That was an idea.

She swiped her screen over to the camera app and swapped to the front facing mirror. She grimaced at the angle of her face, and took a heavy, shaky breath.

Selfies were… not her thing. _Confidence_ wasn’t her thing and Morty had never had any delusions about her looks. Summer and Jessica and half the girls at school knew how to make themselves look like models in the pictures they took of themselves and posted online. They could turn their head the right way and purse their lips and suddenly they were flawless, high cheek-boned, prominent-clavicled goddesses. She’d seen Summer spend hours fooling around with filters and tilting her chin up and down and around until she found the perfect angle but Morty didn’t bother with social media since she kind of lacked the _social_ part of that equation and the thought of sharing any part of her life with the internet set off a series of anxious ticks.

But she knew Rick didn’t entirely hate the way she looked even if he never said anything to support that idea. She’d felt the heat of his stare often enough, drank up the fire he painted across her skin with his burning gaze. He might never say the words aloud but his eyes spoke for him. She tried to channel the memory of those searing glances to bolster her frayed nerve.

Morty carefully flattened her bangs and wrestled with the uneven curls framing her face. She yanked on the collar of her shirt until a sliver of skin peeked out between the top of her shirt and the metal band around her neck, pulling the necklace out from underneath the fabric of her shirt – it’s delicate beauty clashed with the harsh lines of the collar but she’d seen Rick’s eyes stray to the pendent often enough to suspect he liked the way he’d trapped her in it and the irony wasn’t lost on Morty.

Her cheeks were already turning pink from embarrassment and after what felt like a solid minute of trying to coach her face into something seductive and feeling completely ridiculous, Morty tilted the camera so only the lower half of her face was visible, the collar centered in frame. Determined not to spend any more time overthinking it, she bit her lip and snapped the picture.

Her hands felt shaky as she pulled up the text chain with Rick and attached the selfie, actively avoiding looking too closely at the photo of herself before she hit send, her face unintentionally cringing as she sent it off to be judged by the only person she wanted to impress.

After a minute and a half, she was having second thoughts about sending it. She had never sent him a picture of herself before and even though it wasn’t particularly risqué, it was damning for plenty of other reasons. There probably weren’t a lot of sixteen year old girls sending fetish selfies to their grandpas. So yeah, definitely still damning.

At the eight minute mark she was actively regretting it. Why hadn’t he texted back? What was he thinking? Had he seen it, was he mad at her, did he think she looked stupid? She was spiraling and she forced herself to take long steadying breaths while she paced frantically back and forth in front of his worktable.

She was glaring angrily at her silent phone for the millionth time when she caught something out of the corner of her eye. The digital screen that she’d noticed when she first entered the bunker was counting down, the big read numerals reading _98:36:03_ blinking lower with every second.

_98:36:02_

_98:36:01_

_98:35:59_

Morty’s mouth dropped open while her legs froze in place, rooted to the ground like she was magnetized.

No, that timer had definitely been frozen when she’d climbed down the ladder - she was sure of it. She was programmed now to detect anything that might be an explosive and generally a giant numeric countdown screamed BOMB in big flashing letters.

She hurried over and inspected the digital clock displaying the countdown but it was a regular old clock – it didn’t lead to a mess of wires or tanks or gas canisters - hell, it wasn’t even connected to any of his computers. She found that out when she yanked it off the wall and inspected the back of it but it was a just a clock, battery operated and determinedly counting down.

And it wasn’t like Rick would lock her down here just to blow her up, right? Probably. _Maybe_.

Confused and more than a little worried about getting scolded for messing with Rick’s shit, she replaced the clock back on the wall and glared balefully up at the numbers.

_98:33:47_

_98:33:46_

_98:33:45_

Morty wasn’t sure what set her off but she was suddenly, horrifyingly positive that she was being watched. She could feel Rick’s eyes on her, observing her scurry around his bunker like a rat in a cage. Her breaths started coming fast and shallow as she cut her eyes around the room, grabbing at the first drawer she could get her hands on, desperate to find something – _anything_ \- to make her feel less trapped and toyed with but the drawer wouldn’t budge. Nor would the next, or the one after that.

She stilled her frantic scrabbling, uncomfortably aware of Rick’s likely surveillance. She was here to _repent_. To prove she could behave. Rifling through his stuff never got her anything but sharp irritation and she needed him soft and forgiving.

She sat down heavily on the stool once again and tried her best to look apologetic.

More out of habit than any real hope, she set her phone down face up and interlocked her fingers, resting her forearms on the table while she sat as still as she could manage when she was continuously uncomfortably aware of the metal around her neck and the slickness between her legs.

Rick and his fucking mind games.

If she wasn’t so fucked up he’d have driven her insane by now. He was _lucky_ she was so into his asshole authoritarian bullshit. And she was lucky she had such a hard fisted, immoral bastard to play out these disturbing fantasies with. Or maybe it was _because_ of him that she had these tastes at all. After all, before he’d come into her life, she hadn’t been into older men. Or control shit. Or collars or hair pulling or chains or any of the terrible/exhilarating things that Rick had turned her on to. But at least that was one thing Rick was more than willing to take responsibility for, if not with his words, than with his actions.

So she could wait for him. She could prove herself worthy of both his ire and his affection. She was his fucking Morty. She could do anything if it was for him.

Despite her determination, time ticked on and her back eventually started to ache from sitting so still on an uncomfortable stool. She’d been exhausted when she climbed down the ladder, and now, alone in the dim sub-basement with no way to distract herself (she figured it wouldn’t look terribly repentant to surf the internet on her phone) she was losing steam.

She had been on a hike with Jessica that very morning, breathing in the smell of wet leaves and sweet perfume – the thought kind of blew her mind. For a brief moment, she had felt like a real high schooler. She’d tasted the freedom of a fieldtrip and sleepaway camp with her crush and Morty wasn’t sure how she felt about the fact that the overall experience left an aftertaste not too far off from the bland smack of oatmeal.

But hey, Morty didn’t _hate_ oatmeal. She was just used to… more complex flavors.

Then again, she was wearing her grandfather’s collar in his secret underground bunker and lusting after a man four times her age. A little oatmeal once in a while might be good for her.

When she yawned wide enough for tears to spring to her eyes, she finally gave up on looking regretful and stumbled to her feet, kicking the stool back under the desk and glaring around the bunker.

It was neater than normal, something she might not have noticed if she hadn’t been locked down there for as long as she had been. The counters had been cleared off and most of the smaller tools he usually kept scattered around with the sort of planned disorder only Rick could keep track of had been tucked away.

But shoved against the back wall she found a low canvas cot and a neatly folded blanket. She was fairly sure the cot was a new addition; that back wall was usually where Rick kept the aliens he occasionally held prisoner, and the few times she’d seen that unfortunate spectacle, none of them had ever been given a cot. Usually they were strapped to the walls with metal brackets, too busy screaming (or gurgling or vibrating or whatever alien form their anguish took) to get any sleep.

She blinked and tried not to think too hard about it. The cot (clearly the one Rick slept on before he’d upgraded to a bed) was probably for the nights when he got too drunk or too wrapped up in his science to make it upstairs. And it wasn’t likely he could get any _more_ mad at her so she made up her mind to borrow it.

Feeling like a total creep but unable to resist the temptation, she raised the blanket to her nose. The smell of Rick assaulted her senses and set off sparks in her brain. Like a hard landing from a long fall, she realized suddenly how desperately she had missed the scent – the strangely comforting smell of alcohol and solder and the unique musk of his skin. She wrapped the blanket around her shoulders, closing her eyes for just a moment before she shook herself out of her fantasy and settled herself on his cot.

She had tried waiting up for Rick – she realized belatedly her phone was still on his worktable but she didn’t have the energy to get up and she could guess well enough that it was probably nearing three in the morning. And she was tired all the way down to her bones. If he wanted to play the angry and distant card, there wasn’t much she could do about it so she gave into the compulsion to curl herself under Rick’s blanket and lay down, her head resting on her bent arm.

The cot was stiff – only minimally better than the floor would be, but she’d slept in worse conditions. And what she lacked in comfort she made up for with exhaustion.

Surrounded by Rick’s scent and relatively safe amongst the creations of his mind, she let herself drift off into a surprisingly deep slumber, soothing the anxious tittering in the back of her mind with the thought, ‘ _It’ll be fine. He’ll be here when you wake up_ ’.

 

* * *

 

Morty was used to waking up in strange places so when she cracked her eyes open to a dark grated ceiling, she didn’t jerk in panic like she used to those first couple months after Rick walked into her life. Instead she let the memories trickle back to her slowly while she rubbed the sleep from her eyes.

She was in Rick’s bunker. The weight quirking her neck at a strange angle was his doing – or maybe it was _her own_ doing – that was still unclear even after a night of rest. Whatever the case, she was waiting for Rick to return; for him to unlock the collar from around her neck, and let her out of his bunker.

She groaned as she pushed herself into a sitting position and rubbed at her eyes. She hadn’t gotten the best sleep during the field trip – partially due to anxiety over being surrounded by her judgmental classmates and then later because she was cripplingly aware of how unwell her mother was doing by the near constant barrage of angry/sad/manic/drunk texts.

Even though the cot wasn’t nearly as comfortable as the bunkbed at camp, the smell of Rick’s blanket and the electric tang of his workspace were apparently enough to soothe her into a pretty impressive sleep and she felt rested for the first time in days.

When she’d finally rubbed the fog from her eyes, they landed on the red clock, still calmly counting down.

_89:14:22_

_89:14:21_

_89:14:20_

If that clock was right, mom – or Summer more likely - was probably wondering where she’s disappeared to. Assuming Rick was still missing. If he were around, Morty’s absence would be a nonissue – they trusted Morty to him entirely and never questioned his motives. She sniffed and glanced around for her phone.

The long sleep had done her wonders and with a clear head, the thought of calling Rick to apologize wasn’t as agonizing or unimaginable as it had been the night before when she’d been wracked with guilt and tension. If she was careful, she could probably keep the verbal dicing of her stutter to a minimum too, it was always a little easier when she was well rested.

But mostly, Morty was just ready to see this whole mess ended – ready to have Rick back home and have the collar unlocked and hit the reset button on her mom’s growing frustration and disdain.

It was with that thought in mind that Morty stood up, stretched and started towards the worktable where she could clearly see her phone waiting for her, centered on Rick’s desk, exactly where she’d left it the night before.

She was only two steps away from the cot when she heard a tinny beep unusually close to her right ear and fell back on her butt with a hard jerk, a harsh pain around her neck like she’d been clotheslined. She coughed fitfully, a hand at her throat.

Dazed and very confused, Morty traced the collar with her fingers but it didn’t feel any different than it had the night before – just one long, solid stretch of metal. She frowned, wondering irrationally for a moment whether she’d had a seizure or something before she stood up again, approaching the worktable at a slower pace.

At the place where the floor morphed from grates to solid metal, her collar gave out another tinny beep and jerked to a standstill, held immobile as if it was pushing against an invisible wall. It wouldn’t budge past the line on the floor.

Morty breathed out shakily through her mouth and stepped back towards the cot, wrapping her fingers around the metal and working hard to master long, soothing, steady inhales. One more time, _carefully_ , she crept towards the line on the floor only for the collar around her neck to hit a dead-halt at the threshold.

Something almost like a whine escaped the back of Morty’s throat but she was too distracted to be embarrassed.

She tried everywhere she could reach, pacing along the edge of the barrier and letting the metal slide against the invisible wall. She stood on her toes and crawling on her knees, once she even laid down and tried rolling across the boundary but there was no chink, no hole, no weak spot; only a chorus of defiant beeps as her throat pressed uncomfortably against metal.

After a solid thirty minutes of trying everything Morty could think of including an agonizing attempt to muscle the resistant collar across the threshold with all the strength in her legs and arms, she collapsed against the back wall panting, gently prodding at her bruised throat.

She was trapped in an invisible cell.

So far as she’d been able to figure out, the confines of her shrunken prison followed the line that marked the change in metal tiles. The space couldn’t be much bigger than eight by six feet.

And her phone, uselessly sitting on the table in the middle of the bunker, was utterly out of reach. In fact, _everything_ was out of reach. The only things in her cramped space were the cot, the blanket, a small cubicle with a showerhead and a utilitarian toilet tucked in the corner behind the shower stall.

Holy fuck. _Holy fuck._ Rick hadn’t just locked her in the bunker, he’d locked her up like _a prisoner_.

Morty took a deep breath and sighed it out shakily from between her teeth. Okay. She was expecting to get punished. And this was… a punishment. He had _imprisoned her_ in a corner of his super-secret-sub-basement.

_Fuck._

Was she surprised? No. Was this terribly different than the time he’d cuffed her to his bed, gotten drunk, decided to run some errands, and left her there for hours? Not really.

But how long did he intend to keep her down there? A few hours? A day or two?

Her eyes jerked automatically to the red numbers slowly ticking down.

_88:42:36_

_88:42:35_

_88:42:34_

_Oh no. No no no no No NO._

Eighty-eight more _hours_?! What the fuck! That was… (Morty struggled for a moment, counting up in multiples of 24) …almost four whole days! And considering what the clock had been set for when she came down the ladder… technically it _was_ more than… wait…

The clock had been set for more than four days the first time she’d seen it.

Her field trip - if she counted backwards from last night, if she had to _guess_ , it had been four days since she’d last seen Rick.

Knowing him, probably the 98 hours and whatever fucking change that had been up on the clock last night when she’d first discovered the clock.

He’d kept track.

And now she was going to have sit down here with nothing to do but wait for him, hour by hour, minute by minute, _second by second_ , paying for every moment she’d chosen to be away from him.

She barely resisted the urge to scream, instead burying her hands in her hair and tugging in frustration.

She was _furious_ , her vision bleeding red around the corners as she paced in the tiny space afforded to her. Three steps brought her nose to the wall and a new hurricane of rage swirled through her when she realized she didn’t even have the proper room to pace.

That selfish _bastard._ She gave him _everything_ and once ( _once!_ ) she decided to take some time for herself and what does he go and do? Lock her in a space with less square footage than mom’s closet, shuffled downstairs and out of sight like a misbehaved pet.

Worst of all, she felt a hypocritical spike of arousal and her anger was only fanning the flames. She couldn’t quite prove it but she was pretty sure he was conditioning her with sex. Any time she yelled at him, anytime he pissed her off enough that she stood her ground and fought him on something, if she ever raised her voice, he’d make her keep up her argument while he rubbed circles over her clit and licked his way between her folds. And even now when she was so pissed off she was picturing her hands wrapped around his throat, that traitorous dribble of excitement dulled the hard edges of her fury, the idea of burying her fingers in his coarse hair and _pulling_ enticing for an entirely different set of reasons.

She sat down on the cot and cradled her head in her hands, forcing herself to think rationally. Rick couldn’t lock her down there for _days._ People would notice her absence. Summer at least would probably make a bit of noise about it even if there was a chance mom might be happier without her around.

But…

A shaky sigh rattled out her throat, unbidden.

…It wasn’t like Rick had never made someone disappear before...

Morty bit back the tears that were threatening to spill. She didn’t have the _right_ to cry over dad… it was _her_ fault he’d disappeared in the first place.

And he’d – he’d just _vanished_. Almost no one even _asked_ about what happened. The world seemingly… forgot about him.

Only once since that fateful night in Rick’s bedroom had anyone even _mentioned_ dad. One morning a week or so after they’d come back from the Palisade, a week or so after everything _changed_ , Morty had walked into the foyer to discover mom and Rick having a terse conversation with two uniformed police officers. Morty had barely caught the officer asking, “When did you see him last?” before Rick caught her trying to eavesdrop and scowled at her until she disappeared up the stairs. She wasn’t sure what he told the police but they never came back again.

Stranger than that was how mom and Summer carefully never mentioned dad despite his glaring absence. Morty had dreaded for weeks the moment she’d have to explain herself when they’d inevitably ask what happened to dad – she’d wracked her brain for an acceptable excuse only to find none and had half made up her mind to tell the truth - but the conversation she’d been dreading never happened. If anything, on the few occasions dad almost came up, mom and Summer would tense like the reminder of him made them furious.

Their reactions baffled Morty and that weight in her stomach settled in for the long haul.

The traces of dad’s memory – the ones too deeply burned into the house he haunted – had become her worst triggers. The faintest reminder of him would stretch open that wide empty gulf that sometimes swallowed her stomach. Morty carefully did her best to cinch the edges closed, but that void whispered to her no matter how loud she shouted to drown it out and eventually ( _always_ ) she’d wind up seeking out Rick’s company, his attention the only thing capable of silencing that endless howl.

Morty leaned back against the cold metal wall and tried to ignore how hard her hands were shaking.

She had to focus on the good things, cling to them desperately and hope they were buoyant enough to keep her afloat.

Like the fact that in some ways, maybe even _a lot_ of ways, life was better now.

Mom was taking courses from an alien school, (for now over the computer since she had to earn the intergalactic equivalent of a GED) but her plans were to study medicine off planet after that. And with the notable exception of the last couple days, she had been more stable than Morty could ever remember. She drank less, smiled more, went out to dinner with coworkers, and sometimes Morty caught her and Summer laughing and trading jokes while they both stretched out on the Thamulonian bed that Rick had picked up for her when he renovated her bedroom.

And Summer was _hopeful_ in a strange-but-good kind of way. She finally thought she had a future somewhere – one she was rushing to get to for reasons that didn’t include running away from the things she hated – and optimism looked good on her. Rick had promised Summer a spaceship for her eighteenth birthday and even though she shrugged and said ‘whatever’, Morty saw it marked down in the day planner she used for school. As a sister, Summer was nicer now too; friendly and helpful and all the things Morty had always wanted from a big sister but had never quite figured out how to be the kind of person who deserve them.

And Rick –

Morty leaned back against the wall and toed her shoes off, careful to store them underneath the cot lest they accidentally get kicked out of range of the collar. She may as well get comfortable, apparently she was going to be there for quite a while.

With dad gone, Rick was more tyrannical than ever (obviously she was locked in his fucking bunker), but he was happier too. He smiled and laughed with regularity, not always in the mean-spirited way that had been his norm when he’d been trading barbs with dad. _Actual_ smiles. The kind that made him look almost boyish, younger even than some of the old pictures of the _other_ Rick mom had pulled out of storage and set around the house, slowly replacing any photo containing dad with something else: the selfie Summer had snapped with mom and Rick and Morty in the background when they’d gotten ice cream together, a vintage medical print of a ribcage and scapula (the one dad had always said creeped him out), a blurry backlit picture of mom as a toddler balanced on the other Rick’s hip in a warm looking kitchen.

And dad – well, she did her best to avoid thinking too hard about what might have happened to him. She didn’t think… it wasn’t like Rick would… she had made him _promise…_

It was probably better not to know.

Morty flopped back onto the cot, staring hard at the digital countdown.

_88:03:01_

_88:02:59_

_88:02:58_

She turned onto her side and curled into a tight ball. She _deserved_ to be down here. Rick was right to punish her and be cruel. She had earned it. Her idiocy had wiped a man off the _planet_. She’d done something awful and if anyone found out about it, they’d never be able to look at her the same way again.

Well… _no one except Rick_.

And if Rick could stay with her, even when she was a terrible, scum-of-the-earth, family destroying monster, what right did she have to turn him or his punishments away?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just want to say a huge thank you to everyone who picked this story back up!


	3. Chapter Three

At _85:30:00_ something clicked deeper in the bunker but with only one light on and the inability to leave her corner, Morty had no way to determine what had made the sound. A moment later, a faint _whirring_ moved through the bunker and she wasn’t sure what to expect but the low to the ground tray rolling around the corner on small wheels wasn’t what she’d been picturing.

The automated tray stopped right at the edge of where her collar hit the forcefield and Morty squatted down to inspect the unimpressive contents. One empty plastic cup, one toothbrush and mini toothpast, and one nutrient bar – the kind that came standard in any alien survival kit because they kept for literally thousands of years and had enough vitamins and calories to sustain life even though it tasted like sawdust and dog hair.

Morty eyed the offerings warily before she snatched the items up and the wheeled tray reversed and rolled back to whatever hidden panel it came from.

At least Rick wasn’t going to starve her. She hadn’t even _thought_ about food yet, her stomach too busy performing anxious gymnastics, but she was relieved to see it all the same. She filled her cup with water from the showerhead and eyed the little cubicle critically. There was one bar of soap in a divot in the wall but that was the only addition to her mental inventory. The water tasted surprisingly okay – just as good as the water from the kitchen sink – and she sedately chewed on half her ration bar (more for something to occupy herself with than actual hunger), washing it down with sips from the cup.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

By _80:00:00_ Morty was fairly sure she wasn’t going to make it to _00:00:00_ without losing her mind.

It was _quiet_ in the bunker. Too fucking quiet. The only noise was the occasional burble or beep of Rick’s various projects and the creaking of the cot as she nervously bounced her foot. She tried singing to herself softly for a little while, just to break the unbearable silence, but the sound of her own voice made her cringe and she downgraded to humming. It didn’t take long for that to make her feel like an _actual_ lunatic so eventually she gave up on the idea altogether.

Her anger had simmered out; it almost always did. She could _never_ hold on to rage the way the rest of her family could, and while Rick was loudly of the opinion that it made her a pushover, it was one of the few traits about herself Morty didn’t hate. Enough of her mistakes were motivated by stupidity or altruism or her fucked up libido; at least anger didn’t get the chance to add to the list as often.

But she was still upset, she still rankled with the knowledge that she was well within her rights to go out with her classmates on a fieldtrip and a few choice words kept circling her mind when she thought about how _entitled_ Rick was with her time ( _selfish bastard, insufferable jerk, major asshole, complete fucker_ ) but fighting Rick was like arguing with the weather.

With nothing to do but sit and think, Morty fell back on the mental escape she usually used when she was stuck in class and bored out of her mind. Except, thanks to the camping trip, she now had a treasure trove of new memories to play over.

Jessica had gotten bored during lunch on the second day and absent-mindedly braided Morty’s hair, her beautiful, thin fingers carding through Morty’s tresses while she sat rigid and overwhelmed with joy. Morty had tried her best to keep the braids overnight but when she’d woken up the next morning, they’d been fuzzy from her tossing and turning and when Kari made fun of her bed-head, she’d reluctantly unwound the proof of Jessica’s hands on her scalp.

Later that same day, Jessica tugged Morty onto her sleeping bag, forcing Morty to join in on the ‘girl-talk’ the popular girls had started and the rest of the room was pretending they weren’t listening in on.

“You let him put it _in_ you?” Kari demanded from where she lounged across the adjacent bed, the nail file in her hands stilling so she could glare at Trisha with disgust.

Trisha rolled her eyes and kicked Kari’s legs in a friendly sort of way. “Of course,” she said, turning over on her stomach and making her voice breathy like a whisper without lowering it at all. “Not that I’d do it again. He just, like, jammed it in. Two pumps and he was done.”

“Gross. Did it hurt?” Jessica asked and Morty surreptitiously stole a glance at her out of the corner of her eyes. Jessica was enraptured by the conversation even though, honestly, Morty had no idea how they had gotten to the topic of Trisha’s latest sexual exploits. She’d been too distracted by Jessica’s long, smooth legs casually leaned against Morty’s lower back when there was more than enough room on the bunk bed for her to stretch out -  meaning the physical contact was _on purpose._

“Not as bad as my first time,” Trisha shrugged. “ _That_ hurt. But Josh had _no_ idea what he was doing so whatever.”

“Oh, and Michael did?” Kari scoffed, eyes on her nails again.

Trisha laughed and stretched out like a cat. “At least he fingered me first and didn’t just, like, spear me. Even if he wasn’t particularly good at it.”

“Brad was _terrible_ at fingering,” Jessica chimed in and Morty was fairly sure she was about to have a stroke just picturing it. “Wasn’t very good at eating out either. And he made the grossest faces during sex.”

“What, like-” Trisha turned over and started grinding her hips into the mattress, her back arched up so the gathered girls could appreciate her crossed eyes and snarling, panting mouth.

Everyone laughed, even Morty who was starting to feel more than a little confused. “That’s the one. But imagine that just, like, _dripping_ with sweat.”

“Oh my god that’s disgusting,” Kari intoned flatly but she was smiling maliciously.

“Laying under him was like taking a salty shower.”

“You ever, you know, _cum_ with Brad?” Trisha asked and Morty wound her fingers into the hem of her pajama top.

“I mean, yeah…” Jessica didn’t exactly sound confident and Morty couldn’t help the knee jerk reaction of lifting her head. Jessica was blushing ( _blushing_ ) and cracking her fingers one by one and Morty felt her heart swell with that giddy, butterflies-in-her-stomach feeling that Jessica tended to inspire. “I _think_ so…”

“Wait.” Kari jerked up onto her knees and pinned Jessica with a hard look. “Are you telling me you’ve never had an orgasm?”

Jessica’s cheeks darkened but she rolled her eyes and met Trisha’s glare head on. “Yes of course I’ve had an orgasm, _TRISHA._ It’s just not the same with… it just never felt the same with Brad, you know?”

Trisha nodded seriously and Kari quirked her eyebrows in an agreeing kind of shrug and Morty was absolutely lost.

Cumming with Rick was _very_ different from cumming by herself: namely it was about a million times better. Rick could push her body past the point of coherence, seemed to revel in doing so, and – despite his _numerous_ character flaws - he _did not_ disappoint in the sack.

And Morty, despite knowing that Rick was _always_ the exception to the rule, had never imagined sex could be anything less than the spectacular tide of sensation Rick always threw her into whole-heartedly.

“Not-” Morty cut herself off, unaware that she had started that thought out loud. But three heads swiveled towards her and they weren’t exactly hostile so she mustered up the courage to ask, “Not the same, how?”

“So asks the virgin,” Kari bit out, her smile a little mean, but it was worth it when Jessica ripped the pillow from behind her own back and chucked it at Kari’s head.

“Kari, stop it.”

“I’m not a virgin,” Morty admitted on instinct and immediately wanted to scoop those words back into her mouth and choke on them but the three shocked gapes staring back at her told her there were no takebacks.

Jessica sat up and leaned closer, devastating Morty when she was hit with a wave of her pretty-girl perfume. “Morty, you’ve had _sex_?”

“Wha – ye – yeah, so?” She asked defensively, curling her arms around herself and wishing she could sink through the floor, wishing she was up in her bunk hedging her mother’s angry texts, wishing she had kept her fucking mouth shut.

“With _who_?!” Kari demanded, her eyes harsh while Trisha blinked a little vapidly from the other end of the bunk.

“You don’t know – no one from school,” Morty stammered, hyper-aware aware that she was talking too fast. “He’s – it’s an older guy – no one you’d know.” Morty forced her shoulders to shrug in an outward display of indifference but inside she was screaming. Why had she brought this up? Why had she admitted it was an older guy? What was she doing sitting here and dangerously skirting the fact that she regularly had sex with her own _grandfather_ with the mean girls from school?

For one brief, wild moment, she debated texting Rick just so he could pull her out of the mess she’d made but her phone was too far away; turned off and laying on top of her sleeping bag.

Kari crossed her arms, a flat, goading look making the line of her dark eyebrows hard. “Yeah, sure. And where did you meet this ‘older guy’?”

Morty’s was actively fighting off hyperventilating while she silently negotiated with the galaxy to send her help. Let the cabin set on fire or make that volcano under Yellowstone erupt or send an alien species to invade – _anything_ if it got her out of this conversation.

She was wracking her brain for a normal place to meet someone age appropriate outside of school – the park? A coffee shop? The airport? Where did people meet? _Fuck fuck fuck!_

“Was it with your grandpa, Morty?” Jessica asked and the world tilted dangerously as Morty seriously considered passing out. Her heart seemed about ready to call it quits so the idea of fainting wasn’t off the table. She opened her mouth to protest, to scream, to cry, to _something_ , but Jessica continued like Morty wasn’t on the verge of death by stress-asphyxiation. “Did you meet someone out on one of your adventures with Rick?”

Oh.

_Ohhhhhh._

Yeah, that made _way_ more sense.

“Y-” she tried to start but her voice was a harsh rasp. She cleared her throat and tried again, “Y – Yeah. Yeah, he’s – he’s from another dimension.” Morty was impressed by how confident her voice sounded considering she was just about ready to crawl into a hole and die. But what she’d said wasn’t exactly a _lie._

Kari rolled her eyes, slumping back completely disinterested but Tricia turned wide glassy eyes to Morty. “An older guy from another dimension. _Wow_. Was he any good?”

“ _Yeah_ ,” Morty answered and she startled herself with the vehemence in her voice. “Uh – yeah, he _was_ ,” she mentally recalibrated herself to use past-tense, “he was – yeah he was pretty good.”

And Rick was. Cumming with him was like being at ground zero when a galaxy sprang into existence. Watching _him_ cum, watching that light explode in his eyes while he bore into her like he wanted to wring her soul out of her body; that was almost better.

“Lucky,” Jessica giggled, leaning back against the wall. “Are you guys, like, dating or something?”

Morty snorted unintentionally but quickly recomposed herself. “No – no, it’s - _no way_.” And they weren’t. Rick wasn’t _dating_ her. As if he would ever do something so _normal._ Honestly she had no idea what they were. She was fucking her grandpa for god’s sake. They were ‘perverting the natural order of things’ (according to an entry about incest Morty had found in an encyclopedia in the library while she ditched gym class), not _going steady._

Jessica smiled, that beautiful, straight, white smile and bit her bottom lip. “Good,” she’d mumbled and Morty was sure she was the only one meant to hear the word. Before ( _before_ before) that quiet admission would have had Morty’s stomach doing backflips, but now it only tied it up in knots.

Morty sighed out a long breath and glared around the already too familiar dimly lit bunker.

Like the world was trying to play some particularly nasty joke on her, Jessica was suddenly _interested_ in her. Morty wasn’t sure to what extent – it must be purely platonic, it was _impossible_ to think it might be anything else – but of course, after literally half her lifetime pining over the most beautiful girl in the class, Jessica only started to notice her now that Morty was _with_ Rick… or – or whatever the fuck they were.

And whatever the fuck they were, she knew well enough that Rick wasn’t about to let her dip her toes into someone else’s pool. Rick was possessive and greedy and massively hypocritical. Glancing to the big red clock ticking down her sentence, Morty was all too aware of how much it wasn’t worth it to rile him up just to go on a date with Jessica – fantasy-fulfilling though it would be.

Besides, Jessica was perfect in a way that borderline-terrified Morty. God, just imagining getting naked with her had Morty’s nails jumping to her teeth. Jessica was all soft, smooth skin and beautiful curves in all the right places; Morty had seen her in a bathing suit on one _memorable_ occasion and her pale, lightly-freckled skin had shone with the kind of photoshopped flawlessness usually reserved for people in magazines.

And Morty was _nothing_ like that. She was all gangly limbs and strange muscles. Scars and bruises and messy hair. She could run for- _fucking-_ ever thanks to all the adventuring so her legs were okay but that was about the best she got.

Even Rick…

Morty stopped that line of thought and scowled at the ceiling, sighing and rolling her eyes before she let her inner thoughts drift down the groves where they’d already worn deep tracks.

Even Rick was alluring in some strange, unlikely way.

Not that she’d thought that when he’d first moved in. For a long time he was just… just _Rick_. It had always been hard to reconcile him as her _grandfather_ because he was nothing like Grandpa Smith who had always been warm and responsible and doting and unmistakably An Adult; Rick was erratic and juvenile and _spry_ in a way that left her gawking when he’d told her he was in his seventies (something he had cackled at maniacally while slapping her back hard enough to knock the soda can out of her hand).

He liked to steal the Nintendo controller and beat the hard levels in Zelda for her when she got stuck. He successfully disguised himself as a bush on Zorgon XIX by tucking two sparse branches into his belt and staring wide eyed at every farsighted alien that crossed their path. He could run longer and faster than she could – and Morty was fairly sure she could make the Olympic team if she wasn’t so busy getting dragged into near-death situations.

Point was, Rick had never really seemed like her grandpa. But nor was he someone she found particularly attractive until he held her against a wall and fingered her.

Well… that wasn’t entirely it, either.

Rick had always been _appealing_ – of course he was, he was practically tailor-made to be impressive to her. He was confident, absurdly intelligent, took no shit from anyone and, despite his warped sense of humor, really very funny. In short he was the _coolest_ person she had ever met and reminded her of that fact almost daily – even when he was vomiting up vodka and bile all over his sweater he _still_ was somehow cooler than she had ever been on her best days. And yeah, it hadn’t escaped her notice that he was oddly attractive for a man as old and generally gross as Rick was. He was tall and lean with wickedly sharp eyes and a smooth rolling gait that belied the predator below his skin and even before the thought of his looks triggered an immediate response in the pit of her stomach, she was self-aware enough to notice the appeal.

And then they’d started fooling around - or _whatever_ the fuck they were doing – and now his thin, angular shoulders and quick fingers and bare toes all meant so much more to her because she’d watched those muscles strain over her and those dexterous digits wind her up and those toes curl in pleasure.

In other words, now she was totally fucked.

She had to stop thinking about it. About _everything_. Turning off her brain usually wasn’t hard but without her phone or her laptop or something mindless blaring on the tv, it wasn’t as easy to ignore her restless thoughts.

She carded a hand through her hair and grimaced at the feel of it. It had been a little while since she’d showered. The campsite had communal showers (divided by curtains, it wasn’t the fucking _dark ages_ ) but Morty had only braved them once and hadn’t taken the time to give herself a thorough scrub down. She’d been too on edge with so many voices around her, girls joking and laughing and trading make-up tricks. The irony that she could be (and had been) totally naked on _many_ occasions with Rick, sometimes for extended periods of time in public on alien planets while she was uncomfortable in her skin surrounded by girls her own age didn’t pass Morty’s notice and it was just another thing for her to hate herself over. Whatever the case, she had showered fast and hadn’t gone back for another round.

Since then she’d hiked, been rained on, and had at least two separate sweat responses thanks to Rick’s bullshit. She tugged at her shirt and sniffed, _very_ aware that it was starting to smell like her anxious BO. Not that she wasn’t used to living in her clothes for more than two solid days, but usually, when the situation called for that, she was running around outside or being chased or shot at or frantic in some other terrible way, not sitting in the same 8 by 6 space and sucking up her own scent.

She wasn’t totally sure the collar wouldn’t short out if it got wet but Rick wasn’t known for shoddy craftsmanship and if he’d left her with the _ability_ to take a shower, it probably meant the device could get wet. Right? Right.

Morty didn’t love the idea of putting her dirty clothes back on afterwards but it was better than nothing and if they got truly terrible, she could always spot clean them with the bar of soap. Right then, she was most concerned with washing the smell of forest out of her hair – locked down there in the dark, it felt like a cruel taunt every time she caught a whiff of leaves and wet grass.

After a heavy sigh, she peeled her clothes off robotically, tossing them onto the cot and folding herself into the small cubicle that almost passed as a shower stall, closing the dark glass behind her.

She was disgruntled (though not exactly surprised) to find out that the water temperature never raised past tepid but it was motivation to scrub herself down faster. The bar of soap made her hair feel coarse and tangled but she had seen that coming and figured it was worth it if it kept her skin from breaking out around her hair line.

When she turned off the shower, the air cold enough to make her shiver under the water droplets, she tried to slough as much excess water off of her skin as she could, too aware that she didn’t have a towel. She was weighing the disadvantages between using her jeans, her t-shit, or the blanket to dry off when she slid open the dark glass partition and her stomach sank to her knees.

Her clothes were gone.

She’d left them on the bed – she was _sure_ of it – and in the tiny space afforded to her by the collar, it would be impossible to miss them. But the cot was bare except for the coarse blanket. Even her shoes, which had been carefully tucked out of the way, were missing.

A wave of shivers wracked Morty’s body as she jerked her arms up to cover her chest. No doubt Rick was watching now, waiting to see how she’d react, probably laughing his fucking ass off. And Morty was so _over_ her punishment that for a solid three minutes she stood stock-still in the cubicle, letting the excess water drip down her legs and pool at her feet.

_Awesome._

“You’re such a piece of shit, Rick,” she stated aloud, not at all sure whether he could hear her and fairly positive the insult would do her _no_ favors but she couldn’t keep it in. With as much dignity as she could scrape together, she stepped out of the cubicle and swiped up the blanket, wrapping it around her shoulders and settling herself in the corner of the cot, the scratchy wet blanket uncomfortable against her skin.

She glared at the ceiling and into the darkened corners, searching for some indication of a camera, determined to glower through it with as much mire as she had simmering in her guts, but instead her eyes landed on something else.

The little tray robot was back, a pile of folded clothes carefully arranged on top of it. Morty breathed out a gasp and dove for the fabric only for the robot to quickly retreat, rolling back and away, far enough that it was out of her reach.

Morty almost sobbed but quickly pulled herself together, kneeling carefully at the edge of the invisible barrier, her hands raised placating. “No no no! I’m sorry!” she hurried to plead as the blanket slid off her shoulders and a new round of shivering hit her hard. But she didn’t dare move when the little robot stopped its backward retreat. “Rick, please! I’m sorry! You’re not – I didn’t mean it, you’re not a piece of shit. You’re kind and - and generous and – and a genius!”

Morty stared hard at the pile of clothes resting on the tray, willing the robot to roll closer. She _really_ didn’t want to serve out the rest of her punishment nude, the bunker wasn’t exactly balmy and she already felt over-venerable. Like a raw nerve.

“Please, Rick. I’ll be good. _I promise_.”

The damn bastard made her wait another solid minute before the robot rolled forward and she swiped up the articles of clothes as calmly as she possibly could before it sped away, disappearing behind one of Rick’s workspaces.

It wasn’t much: white cotton panties and a white tank top - not anything she recognized from her own wardrobe and the prison-y/asylum-y vibe was not at all lost on Morty – but she was absurdly grateful to shuck off the wet blanket and breath in the smell of clean laundry after so long stuck in her musky camp clothes.

With that small debacle settled, she curled back up on the cot and did her best to comb her snarled hair out with her fingers.

 

 

* * *

 

 

It only took a few more hours for Morty to finally give into her most practiced technique for wasting time: touching herself.

She was fairly convinced Rick wouldn’t approve of it (masturbating didn’t exactly scream contrition) so she tucked herself onto the cot under the now slightly moist blanket and curled up her knees until fabric tented between her legs. Hopefully it would disguise her movements but after nearly 30 hours alone, she couldn’t honestly care how _contrite_ she looked. She was a teenager for fucks sake. And it was rare _a day_ went by without some sort of sexual activity let alone nearly five (the field trip hadn’t exactly offered up an opportunity to get handsy with herself or anyone else).

Between the extended dry spell and whatever horrible chemical imbalances made her such a perverted monster, she was embarrassingly keyed up at the thought of being Rick’s prisoner despite her fluctuating anger and frustration over the situation. But while the bunker and the cot and the collar were all fresh ideas, being at Rick’s mercy was hardly new territory. Ever since the first time she saw him, (since he’d tilted his head up and his clear eyes lit up like a house on fire) her life had revolved around him.

That was exactly the way he wanted it, after all. And Rick tended to get what he wanted.

Their very first adventure together had ended with him asking her to smuggle some massive contraband seed through intergalactic customs by shoving it up her vagina like the world’s pointiest dildo. She had done it, of course. She had been amazed by the alien planet they’d wandered around on for hours and was _thrilled_ that someone as incredible as Rick was talking to her like she was worth his time. So she was determined to prove that she was _exactly_ the kind of sidekick he needed – that she would do _anything_ if it meant he’d keep turning to look at her like he knew a lifetime’s worth of secrets and he might just let some of them slip.

Plus, there was some indefinable quality that hovered around Rick like a fog that made the crazy shit he said seem sane. So when he said “Morty, I need you to stick these _waaaay_ up inside your v-hole,” it didn’t sound nearly as unacceptable as the words would have been coming from anyone else.

She’d hurried off to the bathroom and waddled back, choosing not to think too hard about the gleam sparking in the corner of his eyes. Looking back, she kind of wondered if that was some sort of test; an experiment to find out exactly how much Morty was willing to hand over to Rick.

Apparently everything.

Even back then, her body belonged to him. As a human shield or a suitcase or a gunhand to watch his back. Morty existed to aid and abet his genius. That was indisputable fact.

And something must be wrong with her because of all the things to bolster her less-than-average ego, being useful to Rick was what she prided herself on most. He was a lunatic, a genuine monster, and sometimes maybe _actually_ evil, but there was no one in the multiverse like him.

That was why even now, locked underground in a dark corner like an abandoned toy, the idea that she was _exactly_ where Rick wanted her – it had a sinister sort of appeal. And call it her recently hardwired intuition, but she _knew_ he was watching her, keeping tabs on her, reveling in the complete control he exercised over her life and how easily she moved around his chessboard like a hapless pawn.

Knowing Rick, he was probably even getting off on it. Maybe even now he was sitting somewhere watching her with a hand around his cock, stroking himself leisurely while he watched adapt to the cell he’d trapped her in.

 _That_ thought had Morty carefully dragging her hand down her stomach where she could trace barely-there circles on the inside of her thighs.

Wherever he was and whatever he was doing right then, he had set up this whole show just for her. He’d installed a shower and a toilet, he’d dug his old cot up from the closet in the hall, he’d built and programed a little robot to bring her rations, and he’d scrounged up the blanket from the back of the ship – he’d masterminded an extended stay in the bunker just so he could _thoroughly_ express how much displeasure her absence had caused.

It was almost… sweet... In the most warped, disturbing way imaginable.

She glanced amongst the pipes and wires that made up the visible ceiling, searching again for any indication of a camera. She knew they were there. She knew he was watching.

Even if someone was looking for her (and almost certainly no one was) it would be impossible for them to find her without Rick’s express permission, and he was a stubborn old bastard. If he wanted to keep her down here forever, _he would_.

She was the only one in the family who knew about the bunker. The door was out of plain sight and considering mom’s emotional state, it was safe to bet that even if Rick _never_ came back, his possessions would remain untouched in some strange, misguided alter to his memory. The existence of Rick’s secret bunker might not be discovered for months – maybe _years._ And self-automated as it was with the little tray-robot, she might never see another soul in all that time.

A shiver Morty half hated and half relished rushed down her spine with a familiar trickle of self-hatred.

And if, miraculously, someone were to stumble across the bunker door, Morty had enough experience with Rick’s designs to know it was built to be impenetrable. She didn’t doubt it would be capable of withstanding a planet-destroying event. Her paranoid grandfather wasn’t some hokey doomsday-prepper, he was really, _genuinely_ , planning for a possible future where he and his best inventions needed to be shielded from endgame-level destruction.

So no one would be cracking this nut to get her out. Only Rick had the key.

The gem dangling from her wrist slid a cool trail down her stomach as her hand shifted and Morty mentally recalculated that last thought:

Not just Rick; _any_ Rick. The bunker was safe from everything _except_ a portal.

She paused the teasing path her fingertips were tracing over her lower stomach to fiddle with the small charm, twirling it between her fingers.

Morty blinked heavily at the ceiling and dropped the gem, her fingers retreading their previous path on her skin.

Despite this new and particularly boring form of punishment, she had seen what Rick’s _actual_ rage was capable of and this hit the scale somewhere closer to a temper tantrum. And though she was antsy and stir-crazy and massively fucking over-it, the fact that he wanted her locked in a cage of his own design was just about as close as Rick ever got to admitting that he valued her company.

It was that thought that prompted her middle finger to skim her wet slit, her daydreams and her feather-light teasing enough to make the delicate line she traced slick with arousal and she nearly sighed in relief before a jolt spasmed through her body, her muscles cramping unexpectedly – _painfully_ – before she unclenched and collapsed against the cot, panting.

_…What?_

For a long time, Morty stared vacantly at the ceiling and tried to calm her bizarrely racing heart. What the fuck had just happened? Had she just been _shocked?_

Not at all thrilled to have to experience the pain again but determined to be sure of the source, Morty wrapped one hand around the collar at her neck. Nothing happened and Morty was starting to question whether she had imagined the whole thing when a terrible realization struck her over the head.

Slowly, she dipped her free hand below the elastic waistband of her underwear, her middle finger just barely prodding at the skin above her clit.

She felt the second jolt, a _stronger_ jolt, prominently in the fingers wrapped around the metal at her neck but the sensation traveled to every nerve ending in her body, every muscle clenching achingly until the electricity cut out and her stiff muscles released with a series of irregular twitches she had no control over. Her fingers still prickled with the sensation. A strangled groan forced its way out of her throat while Morty rolled off the cot, catching herself on her knees and leaning over while she breathed through the confusion and the sudden absence of pain.

She _had_ been shocked. For fucking _touching herself._

A series of swears circled her slightly fuzzy mind but she didn’t dare voice them. It was hard to imagine what else Rick might take away from her for cursing him out but she didn’t want to learn that the hard way.

Instead, she kept her lips carefully closed while she vividly played out what it might be like to rip the collar off from around her neck and break his nose with it.

When her heartrate was no longer visibly pounding under her sternum, she turned to glance at the clock over her shoulder.

_71:03:24_

_71:03:23_

_71:03:22_


	4. Chapter Four

Time in the bunker dragged on.

The endless countdown plastered against the back wall only seemed to stretch every second out longer – it attracted Morty’s attention constantly, a particularly cruel form of torture. It was like watching the second hand tick down during the last few minutes of class – except instead of five minutes dragging on for an eternity, she was counting down _four hundred_ of them.

And the wait grew more excruciating every second.

After two years of almost constant adventuring, Morty’s body was badly adjusted to sitting so still. Pacing proved more trouble than it was worth when her shins were banged purple and black from all the times she’d knocked them into the cot but sitting down was worse, her ankle and knee almost always jangling and making the canvas groan a squeaky, infuriating chorus.

By _67:45:00_ , she had picked all the nail polish off her finger nails and considered doing the same to her toes, just to have something to do. She had tried to resist the temptation (Rick would take it personally, no doubt) but with no way to busy her mind or her hands, she was left with nothing to distract her from her nervous ticks. Two hours after that, she had started picking, biting, and tearing at the skin around her nails – a habit her mother hated and Morty had mostly managed to cut out entirely once Rick and all his assorted chaos moved in – but it had slotted back into place like a sick sort of homecoming.

She tossed and turned on the stiff cot, hoping for sleep, but there was little change between laying with her eyes closed while letting her mind wander and the occasional interludes of sleep, especially when she was used to passing out after a long day of adventuring or school or fucking Rick or all of the above. Adding her sudden lack of physical drain to her constant low level anxiety and her inability to get off even though she was _vibrating_ with need and Morty was starting to get a little pissed that what _should_ have been an opportunity to make a dent in her sleep deficit was only adding to the shortage.

By _55:00:00_ she missed sunlight. And moonlight. And the stars. She missed the _sky_. Before Rick ever showed up, for as long as Morty could remember, she’d stared at that big open stretch of space and wondered what was up there. Her discount telescope could only show her so much: dark, out-of-focus splotches on the moon and bright, fluttering specks that were stars.

Now she’d _been_ to the moon. And to the moons of _at least_ thirteen other planets, some of which were so far away, scientists on earth only knew them as theoretical coordinates. And Rick was the one who took her there. Sometimes to steal resources for his science, sometimes to meet up with his sketchy contacts, sometimes just to eat at a dirty hole-in-the-wall that served food Morty could have never imagined.

Like the one that served sentient noodles that tasted like salted strings of heaven – that had been a good adventure. Though it felt a lot less like an adventure than it did _a date_ (but Morty crushed that thought down before it settled too firmly in her sub-consciousness, just like she did every time the weasel-y idea slipped past her guard).

Packed in at a crusty street stall surrounded by aliens shouting out their wares, Rick’s bright gaze had been fixated on her, that almost-sincere smirk crinkling up the corners of his eyes while he watched her struggle to shovel her terrified meal into her mouth, half his eyebrow quirked up in something a little less than derision. He laughed when one of the noodles squirmed halfway up her nose in an attempt to escape, his calloused thumb rough when he swiped up the remaining smear of sauce and licked it off his finger.

After that, she’d half dragged his intoxicated ass back to the ship and he let her fly them just far enough out of the planet’s gravitational pull that they could watch clouds swirl over the surface in a slow, molasses dance. He fucked around with the radio until something with a soft female voice signing in something close to English warbled through the speakers. In that low rasping growl, he turned to her and started in on another half-meandering story (one she’d heard at least twice) about a museum-caper-gone-wrong in the early days of his interdimensional traveling – he was convinced he wouldn’t make the same mistakes now, especially since she was there to back him up. She was small enough to fit in the tighter vent shafts, after all.

It wasn’t the first time she heard that spiel and so she quietly waited for him to talk himself out of it, just like he always did when he remembered those smaller vents were armed with lasers that would dice her into a million cubes of flesh the second his program to shut down the system failed. Someday, he’d probably decide it was worth the risk (once the memory of her bleeding out in the ship faded with time or if some old acquaintance irked him with the reminder of that failure) or maybe he was already working on a ‘fool-proof’ hack. Whatever the case, eventually she’d be shoved into some cramped metal space with the threat of being sliced into sashimi hanging over her head.

But that was kind of okay. That was what she was good for; helping him on the few occasions he actually needed it. And Rick – for all his numerous flaws – hadn’t let her _die_ yet. And considering the way his rough hand had reached across the space between their seats on that not-a-date to trace the faint blue lines of her veins, Morty didn’t think he was likely to give her up anytime soon.

So she had been content breathing in the sharp artificial air of the ship and listening to the smooth rumble of his voice mingle with the singing on the radio until she shut him up by crawling into his lap and pressing her lips to his.

She had _felt_ his smile against her mouth, against her chin, against her neck as he dragged his crooked teeth along the thin skin of her throat.

“You ruin me, Morty,” he had growled into the shell of her ear when she unfastened his pants, pushed her panties to the side, and sank onto him with practiced ease. “ _Jeezus_ , you fucking ruin me.”

In the glass bubble of his ship, the endless stretch of stars bowed over them like they were figures in a snow globe.

By _54:59:59_ , Morty missed Rick.

 

* * *

 

When _48:00:00_ ticked past, Morty was staring at the clock and watching the seconds count down.

Two days down, two more to go. Halfway there.

The tray-robot delivered her another nutrient bar. The last one still sat unopened at the foot of the cot.

Not wanting to upset Rick by refusing his kindness, she reached an arm over and swiped the bar off the robot, tossing it next to the other one while the robot rolled back to whatever hole it spent the rest of its time in.

_47:59:32_

_47:59:31_

_47:59:30_

Morty had made a conscious effort to stop biting at the skin around her fingers, especially once she tore open a hangnail deep enough that she bled for a solid twenty-seven minutes even when she pressed the hem of her tank top to the cut and applied pressure. Now she had moved on to trying to finger comb all the knots out of her hair. It wasn’t nearly as satisfying a pastime (especially since her nails had all been chewed to stubs making the work a bit trickier) but she definitely bled a lot less.

She found another notable snarl and started in on the ends, the topaz gemstone bouncing against her wrist in a friendly sort of way and making her scowl.

Rick hated that she still wore the bracelet. He told her so at least once a week, usually while insinuating that its presence somehow undermined the feelings she had for him. But she kept wearing it and she still _loved_ him so she’d decided his weird insecurities were more his problem than hers though the man had a knack for _making_ his problems hers.

The reality was, she liked the familiar weight of the thin bracelet around her wrist. She liked thinking about the woman who gave it to her, about Ric and what she might be up to at any given moment, what adventures she was stumbling around on, and what kind of Morty might be at her side.

When she thought about it (which she did more often than she liked to acknowledge), Morty hoped Ric had found a nice, clever Morty with a sick sense of humor and pastel-dyed hair who always put a pot of coffee on so Ric could wake up to the smell of breakfast.

Morty tried not to project herself onto that imaginary other version of herself – the one who received all the gentle smiles and soft touches Ric had so happily showered her with during her short visit to the Palisade. Some days she was better at that than others. After forty-eight hours in the bunker with no entertainment but her own thoughts she was worse than ever before, and if she closed her eyes and really let herself picture it, she could practically _feel_ the morning sunlight warming her cheeks as she sat at Ric’s kitchen table.

They’d only stopped in Ric’s simple, park-view loft for a few minutes - just long enough for Ric to top off her flask and tinker with the bracelet at her workbench - but in those few minutes, Morty cooked up a whole fantasy of what her life would be like if she agreed to stay on the Palisade.

She could live with Ric - the woman offered her apartment up almost the moment they were out of earshot of Rick - and though the space wasn’t huge, it was big enough for the two of them.

Mort, a cool Morticia in a leather jacket, gave Ric and Morty a tour of the education campus. It wasn’t quite a school (Ric’s disdained those apparently, not unlike her own Rick and his ‘ _school’s not a place for smart people_ , _Mooooorty_ ’), it was more a connected set of facilities where speakers and experts (unanimously Rics) stopped in for week long intervals to share their skills or insights. According to Mort, there was also a comprehensive network of fellowships that a Morty could sign up for: tutoring, apprenticeships, advanced classes, seminars, lectures, labs, “You name what you want to learn, Counselor Ric will find someone to teach you.”

“What if – what happens if you aren’t very smart…” Morty scraped together the courage to ask, turning to track a lab coat-donned Ric followed by five Morties, all rolling large metal spheres out onto a grassy lawn.

Mort frowned at Morty in a strange, baffled kind of way. “If you aren’t smart, isn’t it just because no one took the time to teach you anything?”

Morty paled. Was that how normal people worked? That was not the case for her. _Not at all._ “I don’t – I mean I think – maybe I’m just unteachable, you know?” She did her best to make it sound like a joke but it fell flat and awkward in the perfectly-regulated, artificial afternoon air.

Mort opened her mouth, no doubt to argue back, but Ric quickly choked down the gulp from her flask and rushed to say, “Classes aren’t mandatory, Morty. They’re only there if you want them.”

Mort furrowed her brow. “Yeah, but why wouldn’t she want them? Doesn’t she want to – she could learn _anything._ ”

“Ah ah ah!” Ric spoke over her loudly but Morty already felt the heavy weight of Mort’s casual confusion and it stung worse than ridicule.

It hadn’t escaped Morty’s notice that the other Morties they’d met didn’t struggle so much with their stutters or fumble around so pathetically on legs that felt too long. Only Morty could have such spectacularly bad luck that even on a planet of Morticias, she was easily the dumbest, most akward one there. And since these were in theory all the Morticias the multiverse had to offer… that made Morty the worst Morticia _in existence_.

_Lucky her._

Morty thought she’d adapted to being stupid but putting that thought together hurt more than she wanted to admit. Especially when she had no idea _why_ she was so abnormally stupid. She had always chalked it up to genetics but Mort was living proof that wasn’t the case. And what would Rick think if he knew he’d inadvertently paired up with the most inept Morticia in the Galaxy? Any one of those girls would make a better sidekick than her (a thought Morty was determined to guard from Rick lest he start thinking about trading up).

For Morty, it had always been too easy to be distracted from class by some brief passing thought or what was going on outside the window or Jessica’s low-cut shirt. That hadn’t always been the case; she remembered doing okay in grade school, back when her mom helped her with the math problems she didn’t understand and dad… well before Rick showed up, the whole family would go to the observatory every year for Morty’s birthday. Back then, even Summer playfully goaded her into practicing spelling and multiplication tables on long car rides, seemingly just to lord her superior intelligence over her, but those strange competitions made learning a little more fun.

But somewhere around middle school, Morty’s grades started to dip. One day the school therapist pulled her out of class to call home and her parents came in for a meeting. Morty had no idea what was said but she could hear her parent’s voices escalating in a familiar crescendo from her seat out in the hall, her cheeks burning with embarrassment.

The ride home from school was frosty silent and neither parent reappeared for dinner, mom busy huffing from her bedroom with a bottle of wine and dad locked in the office that later become Rick’s room. So she and Summer made themselves sandwiches for dinner that night and quickly adapted to fending for themselves once it became obvious their parents were trying to spend as little time together in the same room as possible.  

After that, Morty got used to being left behind in class. Her teachers would occasionally shoot her half pitying looks when they handed back her tests but she wasn’t called to the office again. Eventually she fell behind on her homework too; she had always needed peace and quiet to keep her concentration but silence was hard to come by in the Smith household when both her parents were home.

When Rick moved in, her mom and dad’s arguments marginally decreased but her grades dropped from just barely scraping by to borderline failing. At least with adventures always taking up her time, it was easy to blame the Fs on something besides her own stupidity. Besides, working with Rick was _important_ – way more important than school or grades or going to college. At least that was what Rick told her any time he caught her pouting over a badly marked paper.

Abruptly, Morty realized her fingers had stilled on the knot they’d been working apart and she forcibly shook herself out of her daydream.

The bracelet wasn’t only a memento from Ric; it was also as a reminder of the path Morty set _herself_ on. Because she _chose_ Rick. It was definitely not the smartest decision she had ever made but it was impossible to resist his pull, even if he took being a massive asshole to a whole new level.

After all, _he_ didn’t ask touchy questions about her intelligence; he already knew she was a hopeless idiot and at most, he viewed it as a minor inconvenience. It was impossible to disappoint him because he already thought the absolute worst of her, himself, and everyone else in the multiverse. Anything she did that wasn’t complete shit, he treated like a pleasant surprise. And Morty – well, she kind of thrived in that atmosphere; where there was no place to go but up.

It was psychotic - _he_ was psychotic and she might be turning so herself, but it worked for them.

So for the most part she didn’t regret picking Rick. Even if he locked her in his underground bunker and cut her off from the world for the rest of her life. If she had Rick…

Well, she put up with _a lot_ from Rick. And it wasn’t like he was going to keep her down there forever. _Probably._

She spun the topaz stone between her fingers and sighed.

 

* * *

 

 

By the third time she checked the clock in the _minute_ between _32:45:00_ and _32:44:00_ , Morty bit down hard on her lower lip and told herself that she wouldn’t look at the countdown again for as long as she possibly could.

She had spent the last four hours spacing out and staring at the clock with unfocused eyes so she decided to kick off her new resolution with a shower. Hopefully the dark glass partition of the shower stall blocking it out of sight would make the challenge a little easier. The only other way to truly cut herself off from the endless countdown would be to bury her head under the covers and well… things might just come to that.

Just like last time, the usual comfort of a shower was vastly negated by the fact that the water was barely warm. She hadn’t exactly _needed_ to clean herself – the most strenuous activity she’d managed since her last shower was pacing and even that was greatly limited by the space – but she was just about ready to lose her mind out of boredom. She forced herself to meticulously clean every inch of her body despite the cold water, just to drag out the time, and she found herself counting down mindlessly in her head, numbers flittering past the backs of her eyelids when she closed her eyes.

When she finally turned off the water, she stood in the closed shower stall and let herself drip almost completely dry. It was cold and unpleasant but at least it was a slightly different kind of cold and unpleasant that sitting listless on the cot.

Morty stepped out of the shower cubicle making a conscious effort not to turn to check the time. Instead she studied the floor, discovering that the dirty clothes she’d discarded blindly had disappeared and the tray robot had returned with a fresh tank and underwear. She slid them on, head downturned, and crawled onto the cot, curling up facing the corner and pulling the scratchy blanket over her head, submerging herself in darkness and drifting in her own thoughts.

She hadn’t gone this long without talking to Rick since after she’d taken the shot in the gut for him and nearly bled out in the ship. Of all the ways she had thought Rick might respond to her near-death experience, she never expected him to _ignore_ her. You’d think a guy would be _happy_ she’d saved his life – that maybe he’d appreciate her presence since it had stopped a fucking laser blast for him – but after she blacked out in the ship, her last memory blood trickling off her fingers and Rick _screaming_ her name, he turned a cold shoulder on her like he’d been planning to die and she’d deprived him of the pleasure.

Three days he ignored her. It wasn’t so bad then as it was now that she was in the bunker – she still saw him around the house and lurked over his shoulder while he worked and he would occasionally acknowledge her with a grunt – but he went out of his way to avoid touching her and his eyes studiously avoided her face and he left her behind on an errand, dragging Summer along behind him in her stead.

It sucked. Morty was sure she’d done the right thing – wasn’t that _exactly_ why he dragged her along on his adventures? to watch his back? – but Rick wasn’t acting like he was grateful; he was acting like he _hated_ her. Morty didn’t get it and with the memory of her vision tunneling to black while she gasped for breath still so fresh in her mind, his elusive behavior _hurt._ Was she seeing how easily he’d go on functioning without her? How quickly he’d sub Summer into her vacated space if Morty _died_?

Eventually he snapped out of it. As usual, it took him getting black out drunk, stumbling into her bedroom, and passing out on top of her mumbling incoherently, but the next morning everything was back to the way it used to be even if the breath Morty exhaled in relief was a little tighter than it had been before – completely unrelated to her cloned lung transplant and the metal grafted to her damaged ribs.

Except Morty – who had maybe secretly hoped that Rick might be extra sweet to her when she woke up and noticed how pale and haggard he’d gotten while the intergalactic hospital patched her up – set herself up to be disappointed. Rick wouldn’t be too broken up without her – of _course_ he wouldn’t. Nothing meant anything to him; wasn’t that exactly what he was always telling her?

But even that bleak realization couldn’t make Morty regret what she’d done. Life without him would be much worse than death. Yeah… she didn’t want to think about it.

But the field trip… was all this worth it for a _fieldtrip_?

Rick’s ire was a terrible thing. If she lost his favor, if he got sick of her, if he realized he didn’t need her, if almost _eight_ days apart from her reminded him that he had spent most of seventy years on his own and _thrived_ , she would lose _everything_.

She wondered where Rick was now. Whether he was hiding out on some space station somewhere sleeping off a bender or if he was still drunk at a bar. He might be hooking up with someone older, someone better looking, someone smarter and cooler and more experienced than her. The thought stung but Morty wasn’t about to start lying to _herself._ She was fairly sure he wasn’t exclusive. Not that he rubbed her face in it – in fact she hadn’t seen any evidence of him sleeping with someone else and he never so much as _alluded_ to the possibility which was, quite frankly, _very_ out of character – but it was impossible for her to imagine him reigning in what she knew was an impractically massive libido. Plus he was a genius and she was - well… not… so it wouldn’t be hard for him to hide that sort of thing from her.

Though honestly, if he had any stamina left after all the energy he directed at her, she would be legitimately horrified.

So maybe he wasn’t banging it out with someone else. (In the privacy of her head, she could allow herself to cling to that possibility, however small it might be.)

Then again, for all she knew, he might have come home the moment the trapdoor swung closed - that could have been _him_ kicking it shut, not some program like she’d automatically assumed once she realized the bunker had been set up for a prolonged stay. He could be pacing around in the garage right over her head that very minute; tinkering with the experiments at his worktable, drinking from a bottle of cheap whiskey, grunting at the talkative neighbors who always waved at him when they walked their dog past the driveway.

For mom’s sake, Morty hoped Rick had come back. She hadn’t been in good shape when Morty had last heard her sobbing through the wall _three days ago_. If mom had to wait it out while Morty served her punishment, it wasn’t likely too many of her brain cells would make it to the other end.

No, even if the thought of Rick continuing on unbothered by her absence ten feet above her made Morty’s heart hurt like it was full of lead, she still had to hope he was there. Or else, when she finally climbed up that ladder, what would be left of her family?

 

* * *

 

 

Eventually Morty managed to doze, her dreams murky and troubled and filled with locked doors. In the half-stupor of waking up, she forgot all about her resolution to ignore the clock and checked the time on reflex.

_18:03:21_

_18:03:20_

_18:03:19_

Less than a day. 

Morty’s heart pounded in anticipation.

How would Rick treat her once the clock ran out?

He must have… there was _a chance_ that he missed her, right? That was why he was making such a big deal out of her leaving him in the first place. Right?

Knowing Rick, he would treat her like nothing had happened. He’d slide down the ladder – maybe drunk, probably late – toss her the key to the collar and tell her to get in the ship because they had places to be. He’d slot her with that look; the hard, serial-killer look that kind of scared her and impractically turned her on while he asked, “What did you learn?”

And that would be it. Life would go back to normal. She wouldn’t ask to go on any more field trips. She wouldn’t push the issue of school. She wouldn’t do _anything_ to set Rick off.

Knowing how close the clock was to running out (relatively) made it hard to sit still. She paced the cell again, absently counting in her head while the seconds ticked by.

She tried to make herself presentable. Burying her head under the blanket for hours on end had turned her hair into a nest of tangles again so she carefully combed her fingers through her tresses. She folded the blanket and tucked the uneaten ration bars under her cot. She brushed her teeth and stretched.

And time counted down, painfully slowly.

At _07:00:00_ she was fairly sure she was going to lose her mind, turning laps around her cot like a caged animal.

By _04:00:00_ , she practically had. Her nails were already bitten to raw stubs but her thumb kept tracing the edges looking for something to pick at.

By _02:00:00_ she didn’t think it could get any worse but once the hour slot read _00_ she was practically vibrating with the desire to start screaming, more because her insides were a tangled mess of emotions than any belief it might improve her situation.

When the countdown reached ten minutes, she reminded herself forcefully on repeat that the odds were good Rick wouldn’t just materialize at _00:00:00_. He was probably blacked out somewhere. Or he might hold off to purposely fuck with her. And there was the fact that even if he was sober and relatively invested in getting her out of there, there was no way he was staring at a clock countdown the same way that she was.

So she shouldn’t get her hopes up. That always hurt a lot worse.

When the minute counter ran all the way down to _00_ , she jumped to her feet, her anxiety a coiled ball of hot wires in her stomach.

Jeez, this was going to kill her. She was going to die. Her heart was beating so fast it was going to explode and Rick would be left with nothing but a blood stain to hose of the walls.

_00:00:15_

_00:00:14_

_00:00:13_

She balanced on the balls of her feet, right at the edge of the invisible line that held her collar, leaning forward against the press of metal on her throat. Her eyes were watering and she didn’t know what to do with her hands – they tightened into fists at her side before her thumbnail automatically jumped up to lodge between her teeth.

_00:00:09_

_00:00:08_

_00:00:07_

Morty wasn’t ready.

She was _achingly_ ready.

She was going to throw herself into his arms.

She was going to clock him in the jaw.

She was going to beg his forgiveness.

She was going to wring his neck.

_00:00:02_

_00:00:01_

_00:00:00_

She barely heard the _whoosh_ of a portal opening over the roaring of her own blood in her ears.

In a swirl of green particles, Rick was standing in the center of the room and all Morty could do was gape.

The oxygen whooshed out of her like a pressurized hole had ripped open in her side while something close to terror filled in all the empty space in a confusing, suffocating wave.

Rick was massive – not just in size though the eyes glaring down at her were more than a foot higher than hers. They _always_ were but somehow in that moment it felt new all over again, like the day he’d tilted his head down and ruffled her hair at the foot of the steps. It was in the way he squared his shoulders and tilted his neck until it cracked while two electric eyes bounced between her messy hair and the nails tucked between her teeth and the collar wrapped around her neck.

All those times she’d told herself adamantly that she didn’t miss Rick, that she wasn’t going to put up with his bullshit this time, that she was going to put her foot down and demand he – what? respect her? treat her like an equal?

_What the fuck had she been thinking?_

She wasn’t his equal, it was obvious the moment he stepped into the room. It was like the galaxy warped around him, the invisible net of the cosmos dipping to carry his weight. And she felt the pull towards him like gravity.

“-ick,” she croaked, her voice hoarse from disuse. She cleared her throat but she didn’t have the bravery to try again, not with Rick glowering down at her with an anger she’d only ever seen him direct at something he was planning to kill.

Morty had thought herself an expert at reading his body language – she knew what tool he wanted from a quirk of his wrist, knew he was tensing for a fight from the shift of his foot, knew it was time to cut him off from how loose his head bobbed on his shoulders – but the steady, perfectly still way he braced his weight evenly between his legs, his crossed arms, and the flat line of his eyebrow; he was giving nothing away except that he was _furious_.

A traitorous rush of heat bloomed in her core and Morty dropped her eyes, doing her best to keep her hands from fidgeting. She _hated_ that just the sight of him was enough to wind her up; that even his _anger_ could inspire moisture to leak between her legs after so long without laying her eyes on him.

“Against the wall,” he growled and his voice was rough like torn paper. Morty obeyed on instinct, backing up until her shoulders hit metal. “Turn around, hands flat on the wall.”

Even though the command _terrified_ her, even though her animal instincts rallied against the idea of turning her back on a known predator, she spun in place slowly and braced her palms against the wall. Her pussy clenched, the mix of fear and excitement making her _achingly_ turned on, her quick breaths steaming the cool steel in front of her face.

His footsteps were calm and measured behind her, the sound of something that _wasn’t_ her so bizarrely unfamiliar after four days alone in her own silence that they echoed around her head like the pounding of a hammer. She could almost feel the heat of him behind her but his footsteps stopped before their bodies made contact, the unknown distance between her back and his front sizzling with energy that left Morty quaking.

That musky, electric, whiskey smell that could only be Rick overtook her, a wave of arousal almost immediately following suit. Morty swallowed heavily, her body trembling as she fought the impulse to spin around, to meet him head on, to drink in his thin build and stern jaw and hard eyes. That one brief look she’d gotten of him wasn’t enough, not after so long apart, not when she just realized how much she’d missed his crooked teeth and twisted smile, how much she craved that spark in the back of his eyes that he only got when he was looking at her. She _needed_ it. She needed _him._ And somehow he was still being withholding.

Morty breathed out a shaky breath and tried to keep her legs from trembling.

Her entire lower body jerked when the toes of his shoes nudged at her ankles, kicking her legs apart, spreading her stance. She bit down hard on her lower lip and tasted blood. After so long without any kind of release and with Rick silent and taciturn at her back, she was already desperate. Desperate to get off. Desperate to get _him_ off. Desperate to turn around and melt under his glare.

“Rick-” she rasped, her voice hoarse for an entirely different reason than disuse, asking for something, for anything, but she should have known it wasn’t her place to speak first.

A hand fisted in her hair, pressing her forehead hard against the wall and she breathed out a sound like a gasp. His other hand was rough where he caught her hip, pulling her back while the grasp in her hair kept her face against the wall, sliding it lower as he forced her to bend at the waist. She braced herself against the steel with her palms, her fingers scrabbling uselessly at the smooth metal for something to cling to.

“I told you you’d regret it, Morty.” His voice, after so long without it - after he’d burned that gravelly rasp into her very _soul_ \- practically set her on fire.

“I’m sorry Rick,” she whimpered unevenly, feeling pathetic and small and disposable. Another gush of heat pooled in her core.

“Sorry isn’t going to cut it,” he said gruffly and she unconsciously rolled her hips. “Eyes on the ground.”

Morty obeyed, her body following the order before her mind had even processed the words, and her vision – blurred with tears – focused on the grated metal under her bare feet.

He wasn’t gentle when he caught her underwear by the back hem and yanked it down, the cold air startling against her swollen, wet folds. She was trembling so hard she was practically rocking on her toes but Rick didn’t soothe her like he usually would with a soft stroke along her spine or a hand at her hip. Instead he grunted, animalistic and threatening, hovering behind her out of sight.

In the silence of the bunker, the sound of Rick’s zipper sliding down was deafening.

The gasping grunt he wrung out of her when he pushed into her to the hilt was infinitely louder. No warning, no foreplay, no time to prepare. One second she was a quivering mess and the next she’d been speared. The sting of pain only escalated her overstimulation and nonsensically, _blindingly_ , she came.

“ _O – oh - fuck_ -” she stammered, the words shoved out of her unevenly when Rick started violently thrusting. The gruff chuckles at her back told her Rick _knew_ – he knew how _easy_ she was - and a wave of humiliation and arousal flooded her stomach like mustard gas.

“You wanted to get away from me, Morty?” Rick grunted, his pace brutal and punishing. “You wanted some space?”

“No – Rick-” she huffed pressing her wet cheek to metal, the pendant around her neck bouncing off her chin with every thrust. Rick braced himself against the wall, his hand inches from hers. Excruciatingly close but at the same time _unreachable_. The only place they touched: the almost unbearable stretch of him filling her up.

“You wanted a bit of _freedom_ , Moooorty? Well I _own_ your freedom. And I can take it away.”

Against all logic - against her _beliefs_ \- his words were winding her up again. Her body was a thousand nerve endings all laser focused on the point where his skin met hers; where his cock slid against her sensitive inner walls, where the rough zipper of his pants scraped against her ass, where the heat of his body curled a few inches above her back _almost_ warmed her skin.

Her arms were aching – straining to keep her from being pummeled into the wall. She had rolled onto the tips of her toes and her shaking calves threatened to give out under her. The only part of Rick she could see in her head down position were his legs – fully clothed, spread, and almost comically bent to accommodate her significantly shorter height.

The rush of affection she felt at the sight would have been embarrassing if anyone had read her mind. For the thousandth time, she wondered whether Rick could. He shifted his footing and Morty steadfastly turned her eyes away, shutting down the thought, _just in case._

“You’re mine, Morty,” he growled around a groan and like Pavlov’s dog, her pussy clenched. It was his mantra as he started careening up the cliff to his climax and she knew what he’d be asking next. He did it every time. Morty liked to think it meant he cared - even if he only knew how to be possessive. “Say it, Morty. Tell me who owns you.”

“You do, Rick!” It came out mostly in a gasp as his rhythm turned wild. “ _I love you, Rick_.”

His hips jerked spasmodically, his gut deep groan vibrating up her spine like a shiver, and Morty felt a rush of warmth and wet that wasn’t her own. She was so close to cumming again she could feel her inner walls fluttering in anticipation.

“Fuck yeah you do, buddy,” Rick muttered, his body curved over hers, both hands braced on the wall above her head. His chest still didn’t touch her back but he was so near, the two sides of his lab coat dangled over her back nearly enveloping her, wrapping her up in a sick imitation of an embrace, teasing her with a hint of physical contact.

But Rick didn’t curl his arm around her waist. He didn’t trail a finger to her clit and rub circles over it until she came like he usually did when he finished ahead of her leaving her all wound up.

Instead he pushed off from the wall, straightening his spine and pulling out of her with an uncomfortable squelch. The absence of him was a physical blow and Morty almost collapsed, her legs dangerously wobbling underneath her. She was so used to Rick steadying her, used to his strong hands reaching out to hold her up and maneuver her into a place she could rest and recover, that she almost slammed her head against the wall when she failed to brace herself in time.

“Rick?” she barely whispered, the sound of his fly zipping up nearly drowning out his name.

Morty turned just in time to catch Rick shoot a portal into the open space next to her cot. He disappeared through it without a backward glance, the bottom hem of his lab coat the last thing to swish through the swirl of green like the tail of a cat vanishing around a corner, and the portal spiraled out of existence before Morty could stumble after him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> angst and porn and angst and porn


	5. Chapter Five

Morty Smith had a lot of occasions to cry in the short sixteen years of her life. Scrapped elbows. Broken legs. Spine-melding nanobots and shots to the gut.

When she was seven, mom overturned a glass of red wine onto dad’s head. When he stormed into the living room where Morty had been watching TV, she was sure the red liquid was blood. She sobbed so hard she burst a blood vessel in her eye. The house had been quiet for a week and a half but the white around her pupil was still stained red the next time Morty heard her mother raise her voice.

When she was in the sixth grade, a new girl transferred into her homeroom in the middle of the year. She wore t-shirts sporting metal bands and her hair was wound into elaborate braids and Morty didn’t think she had ever met anyone so cool. For a week she sat with Morty at lunch, walked with her between classes, and called her up at night to talk about almost anything while Morty breathed and listened and felt her heart swell.

But the next Monday, she sat Morty down outside the cafeteria and told her she had found other friends; people with similar interests, people she got along with better, people _more on her level_. She was even nice about it - didn’t ghost Morty or string her along like she could have - and maybe that should have made it hurt less but it didn’t.

Morty made herself sick with crying, stayed home the next three days in a black fog (half hoping her ex-friend would notice her absence, feel guilty for dropping her, _miss her if even just a little_ ) but her phone never rang and Morty deleted all the metal music she’d downloaded onto her computer.

Her dog ran away and her dad disappeared. She’d been kidnapped, sex trafficked, and strung up to hang in a lunatic’s prison-mansion. She’d watched planets explode, she’d _made_ planets explode, and one time she saw a woman holding a baby be swept away in a tidal wave only twenty feet from where Morty was standing on dry land, their hands outstretched towards one another, never to touch.

Morty could have filled a small swimming pool with all the tears she’d wept in her short life, but that night in the bunker - when Rick pulled out of her and turned to vanish through a portal - leaving her alone again, _trapped again_ , holed up underground without so much as a head pat or a backward glance, she cried a whole ocean of tears.

When the portal spiraled closed, there was one breathless second when Morty was still mentally running to catch up. _One last second_ when she thought she had made Rick happy, that he would forgive her, and he’d only left her behind because she’d been too slow. Any second now he would open up another portal and stick his head out, ribbing her for making him waste his portal fluid before grabbing her around the arm and tugging her through.

But the silence of the bunker remained unbroken. The same dim, constant lighting she’d been living with for four straight days was uninterrupted by a flash of green. If it weren’t for the faint cloud of whiskey that still hung in the air and the soreness between Morty’s legs, she might have thought she’d imagined the whole thing entirely.

That was when the tears started – a steady, constant stream that Morty was fairly sure would never stop.

Her legs gave out under her, her knees hitting the metal floor hard and she was dimly aware that they would be bruised but the pain didn’t register the way it normally would. Maybe because she was too busy hyperventilating. She couldn’t seem to catch her breath, like there was a rope around her neck and it was slowly tightening, her head heavy and unsteady on her shoulders for lack of blood.

Her wide panicked eyes found the clock on the wall, but the calm numbered ticking that had simultaneously kept her sane while she lost her mind was dark. No slow countdown to when everything would be _okay_ again. No digital numbers to keep her from spiraling into herself. Nothing to distract her from the hole she was fairly sure had just been punched through her heart.

With shaky hands and legs, she crawled to the edge of the cot, dragging herself onto it so she could lean her head down between her knees. In the new position, her tears leaked up her eyelids, gathering in her eyebrows until they dripped off her forehead. Morty watched them puddle on the floor below her.

She didn’t understand. She had served the time designated and he had appeared the _moment_ the clock wound down. Why then did he leave without her? Why hadn’t he _touched_ her? _What else had she done wrong?_

Rick usually couldn’t keep his hands to himself. Sex was _always_ full contact. Even if they weren’t fully undressed (and often times they weren’t – he really liked quickies mid-adventure), he’d pull her back against his chest or press in close to her neck, or run his hands over whatever part of her he could touch. He liked to hold her down and pull her hair and put his mouth on just about any inch of her body worth biting.

And it wasn’t just during sex. Despite the cold, aloof personality Rick so loved to cultivate he almost always had an arm draped over her shoulder. Or a hand cuffed around her arm. He ruffled her hair and kissed her forehead and play wrestled with her on the couch for the remote and all that he did _in front_ of mom and Summer.

When their relationship… changed… Morty had been sure he was giving them away – touching her too much, taking too many liberties with her body. But no one said anything. Of course they didn’t. Rick _owned_ Morty and everyone knew it.

Morty’s heart ached. She realized distantly that her crying had passed the usual silent weeping she’d long ago mastered with a mother who ridiculed tears and progressed into loud, gasping sobs. She would kill for Rick’s hand in her hair. Or his lips on her temple. Or even just the weight his cold, angry eyes observing her suffering like she was a particularly disgusting bug. That would be better than _nothing._

But somehow she’d let him down. The thought had her slouching over to curl into a ball.

She wished it was easier to hate Rick. She wished everything about him; his smell, his smile, his rough hands, his gruff voice; wasn’t so tightly linked to whatever chemicals in her brain made her happy because even though she _should_ pinch him out of her skin like a deer tick, she knew she’d never get the head.

And it didn’t help that… maybe if all this had happened before ( _before,_ before) she might not be so fucked up. Maybe it would be _easier_ to call him a villain and cut him out of her heart but then he’d gone and…

Less than six months ago, she watched a male version of herself in a cop uniform kick Rick’s face in like a pumpkin. When she’d been dragged away from him, he hadn’t been moving, had _barely_ been breathing, and his face was such a mess of blood and meat she had been sure his head was caved in.

She hadn’t cried then. Whatever she’d been feeling, it was too big for tears - too big for _any_ human expression – if she opened her mouth to scream or sob or whimper, it would have been too little compared to the giant hole that had just opened up inside of her, sank through her feet, and expanded to fill half the universe with emptiness. She wanted to _explode_ with anguish. She wanted to set herself and the world on fire. She wanted to shake loose every stone, every boulder, and every mountain until everyone was buried under gravel.

She had been frozen, stuck on the other side of the mirror, _dead._ Deader than Rick in a lot of ways because Rick would last forever – not just his alternate selves but the things he’d touched and the people he’d met and the places he’d changed. The multiverse and Rick were forever entangled and the waves of his influence would ripple for millennia.

And no rash action or brave feat or desperate tribute would be enough to express her agony at the idea of living in a world without him. Nothing would _ever_ be enough. Not if Rick was gone.

So now she _knew_ what it was like to be in a world without Rick at her side. She had spent nearly twelve long hours in that headspace and feared going back - would give up _anything_ to avoid it, even her boundaries and her freedom and her sanity.

Because if he _left_ her – just turned his back and disappeared through a portal and never came back - that big hole would open up in her again. Maybe it already had. She wondered if it was only the thought that _she_ had been responsible for killing the most brilliant man in the multiverse that left her so ready to end it all when he’d been clobbered half to death on her account or whether she was so tied to him that she would never be able untangle her own threads.

It was that hole that had dragged her back to the cell with Rick on the Palisade; it was why she left a world filled with kind Rics and bright Morties that listened to her when she spoke and wanted her to be happy under her own conditions. Because asking her to leave Rick after watching him nearly _die_ to keep her at his side – and then rise from the dead like a furious wraith to rescue her - was just about the worst timing Morty could imagine.

Morty’s fingers found the topaz stone around her wrist. She thought _hard_ about squeezing that stone until it popped between her fingers like a grape but with a teary sigh, she yanked off the bracelet and chucked it at the glass wall of the shower cubicle.

Whatever Rick was doing, she had to wait it out. She hoped to _god_ it wasn’t another 98 hours down there alone but even if it was, there wasn’t anything she could do about it. She still _chose_ him, even if there were a thousand reasons why she shouldn’t. Even if the back of his head disappearing through that portal kept replaying itself against her closed eyelids, festering into something horrible that was poisoning her heart.

Apparently Rick could walk away.

And that was a _terrible_ realization.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Morty had no idea how long she lay on her back and let tears stream down the sides of her face, her arm bent and thrown over her closed eyelids like she might be able to press them back in; long enough that her eyelashes were nearly crusted shut and her arm fell asleep and when she sat up it swung down like a dead weight.

She didn’t want to move, didn’t want to _exist_ , but she was only too familiar with the after effects of crying so she forced herself to get up and swallow three cups of water. She retrieved the bracelet from in front of the shower too, more because she knew Rick would take any opportunity to get rid of it than an actual desire to wear it and be reminded of all the possibilities.

On reflex she glances at the dark clock and sighed, sitting heavily on the cot and hanging her head in her hands.

To do this to her was unusually cruel. And if she thought about it carefully – and allowed herself to imagine that Rick must at least _sort_ of like her company if he always sought it out - he was denying himself just as much as he was denying her. After all, _she_ wasn’t the one who always stretched an arm out behind _him_ when they sat on the couch.

Leaving him – even if it had only been for a few days for a fucking _field trip_ – must have really hurt him.

The thought settled in her stomach like a stone.                                            

It wasn’t like Rick knew how to express his emotions. He knew how to lash out. How to get revenge. _How to get even._

There were so many people more suited to him than Morty, they’d met them all over the multiverse. Smart people, talented people, people so terrifyingly beautiful they inspired euphoria with just a glance.

Morty didn’t stack up next to any of that. Besides her brainwaves, the most compelling thing she had to offer Rick was her love – her _unconditional_ love - her ability to love him because of his weaknesses just as much as for his strengths.

And if that was all she had, maybe it was better to just lean into it.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

At some point, Morty fell asleep. Though it was less like falling asleep and more like drifting into a nightmare realm but that wasn’t too far off from what had become the norm down in the bunker.

First she dreamt she was wandering the school halls, lost and disoriented. She forgot her school locker combination, the numbers on the dial a strange blur as she grew more frustrated and confused and alarmed. Eventually Mr. Goldenfold found her in the hall and started yelling at her. That wasn’t her locker anymore. She’d flunked out. And the previously empty hall was suddenly filled with students laughing and pointing and chanting “You’re an idiot, Mooooorty,” in a chorus of voices too gruff for a pack of teenagers.

Her dreams shifted.

She was in her bedroom upstairs and there was _something_ in the kitchen. Something angry and ominous and bad as unseen things can only ever be in dreams. Morty knew it was up to her to appease whatever lurked in the kitchen - clanking glassware and running the faucet too long - but she couldn’t for the life of her remember what would please the beast. She circled her room, opening drawers and staring blankly at item after item as she lifted it and weighed whether it would stop the thing downstairs from breaking dishes but she only grew more frustrated as each flimsy object melted into sand between her fingers.

Her dreams shifted again.

At first she thought she’d woken up but her body was frozen, paralyzed, laying on the cot in the same position she’d fallen asleep in. It was hard to keep her eyes open – they were dry and heavy and she was about to give up entirely when a cabinet across the bunker _thunk_ ed.

A panel slid open, one Morty had never seen move before – one she had no idea could open at all - and _dad_ folded out of it disjointedly like a marionette with tangled strings. His clothes were ripped and torn, his hair mussed liked he’d gotten into a fight, and Morty felt her heartrate pick up speed.

It was a familiar dream, one she’d had often in childhood (though normally he was dripping wine-colored blood) and she knew enough about sleep paralysis to know she was still dreaming, still _stuck_ , and the only thing to do was let the monster come for her. But that didn’t make her want to cower under the covers any less.  

In the gloom of the bunker, dad’s eyes had an eerie glow, two pinpoints that only flashed when he met her horrified stare. “Close your eyes, Morty,” he sing-songed and it had been so long since she’d heard her dad’s voice, is surprised her she still remembered it so perfectly. “Go to sleep. Your daddy gets to play when you’re in dreamland.” He tugged his shirt over his head, the not entirely unfamiliar sight of her dad’s flabby stomach suddenly disgusting because she knew what he meant to do. As if he read her mind, his hand jerked to his fly and unsnapped the button.

It was nonsensical and _only a dream_ but also the most terrifying thing she could imagine. Her skin erupted in goosebumps and she fought against her own paralysis, horrified by her helplessness. And he kept getting closer, step after heavy, echoing step. Morty squeezed her eyes closed because she didn’t want to see this, didn’t want to know what her fucked up imagination was about to make this monster version of her father do, Rick’s name forming in her mind unbidden like a prayer.

The whoosh of a portal and the loud _crack_ of metal against metal snapped Morty’s eyes open on instinct.

Like magic Rick was there, a crowbar imbedded in her dad’s skull, sparks flying out of the dent where his brain should be as his body crumpled to the ground. Morty, finally able to lift her arm even if it weighed a thousand tons, jerked her hand off the cot where it hung limp over the edge, her knuckles brushing the ground. Rick turned to her, their eyes meeting for the first time in a million years, and Morty was fairly sure the electricity burning behind his blue eyes raised all the hair on her head.

She blinked once, heavily, and something pricked her arm - a mosquito, a bee, a Sumatrarian scrat beetle (shit, those were poisonous) - but her arm was too heavy to swat the pest away. Last thing she saw of that dream was Rick, tucking something in his pocket and yanking the crowbar out of her dad’s skull and bringing it down again in a heavy swing.

There were no more dreams after that.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

When she woke up, she was curled up on her side. She must have gotten cold and pulled the blanket over her in her sleep because she was pretty sure she last remembered it balled up in an uncomfortable pile underneath her back.

The plastic tapping of a keyboard startled her out of her sleep-murky pouting and she opened her eyes, her last dream still fresh enough in her memory that she broke out into goosebumps on reflex. But it wasn’t some terrifying robot version of her dad creeping across the room with a sinister leer.

It was Rick.

Rick was in the bunker.

He was typing at a computer terminal no more than fifteen feet away from where Morty still lay curled up on her side, her heart racing. He was on the comfortable roll-y chair he favored when he was coding, his elbows on the armrests, his foot tapping out a rhythm only he could hear.

Morty was sure the suddenly loud sound of her escalated breathing had already alerted him that she’d woken up but he didn’t shift his posture. Didn’t turn to glance at her or stiffen his shoulders.

Nor did he shoot a portal and vanish through it. Morty was willing to consider that a good sign.

Slowly, like she might spook a startled deer, she leaned up and swung her legs over the edge of the cot while her eyes drank him in like the first breath of fresh air after a long space flight.

His silhouette was so familiar her chest hurt from missing it. How many hours of her life had she spent watching him work, glancing up from her phone or her homework or a daydream just to appreciate the muscle that clenched in his jaw when he concentrated or the sharp line of his shoulders when he stretched? Keeping him company while he tinkered away was like listening to a masterpiece symphony and it felt like a lifetime had passed since she’d simply sat nearby and absorbed his unexpectedly calming presence.

Plus, despite her terrible fear of him leaving, his back was a thing of beauty. Rick had no right to look so good in his _seventies_.

“Morty,” he rasped, scaring the shit out of her and nearly making her shout as her thoughts and not-so-discreet ogling slammed to a sudden halt. “Hand me my disintegrator.” He still faced away from her – head turned to the screen – and all she could see was the quarter profile of his face, the edge of his cheekbone and the curve of his jaw backlit by the computer.

Blearily, Morty scanned her eyes across the bunker. His gun was on the counter closest to her, perfectly centered on the worktable under the light. Right where her collar had been. And where her phone _should_ have been but was instead conspicuously missing.

Morty stood on unsteady legs and approached the line that marked her prison.

Would she really put it past Rick to demand she fetch him something while her collar still kept her corralled? No, not at all. But his tone was quiet and serious – almost _soft_. And what choice did Morty really have? She tentatively approached the invisible barrier.

Too aware that Rick was in the room, she only slowed infinitesimally as she crossed the line, only stuttered her gait enough that if he _was_ fucking with her, she wouldn’t embarrassingly clothesline herself again. But her bare foot padded right over the line on the floor for the first time in over ninety-eight hours.

She didn’t fully believe it until she was in front of the counter, staring around at the same scenery from a slightly different angle and struggling with a strange echo of vertigo. She glanced back to her corner – her prison – and it looked so unimpressive from five feet away, almost unrecognizable. It had been a little while since she’d thought about how small the space she’d been trapped in was - probably because she’d adapted - but looking at it from the outside, it was unimaginably cramped.  

Irrationally, she felt the early symptoms of an anxiety attack set in: her body flushed with sweat, her hands shook, that detached, out-of-body feeling cranked up the volume on the blood pumping in her ears into a deafening _wuub wuub wuub_ , turning her heart into a subwoofer _._

“Morty,” Rick promted again, his voice almost neutral, but Morty still jerked.

She picked up the gun with both hands and padded around the long worktable.

Now _this_ was vertigo – the five steps to Rick’s side stretched, the ground pitching under her feet like she was trying to walk across a ship weaving through an asteroid field. Morty might have passed out if her adrenaline wasn’t working so hard to keep her on her feet.

One step and she caught the tiny shift he made, turning his head slightly away from the screen. Two steps - she could count the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. Three – she barreled into that familiar cloud of oil and alcohol and skin he carried around with him everywhere. Four – she watched his chest rise and fall with enviable even breaths. By the fifth step she was at his shoulder, his disintegrator lying flat on her two open palms.

She watched him inhale deeply, and resisted the overwhelming, impractical, and poorly-timed urge to kiss the slope of his neck, sure as she was that he would shove her away and half infuriated with herself for still clinging to the overwhelming surge of devotion despite everything he’d done.

Instead she parted her chapped lips and tried to moisten them with her dry tongue. “Rick?”

He turned – _just slightly_ \- and cut his eyes up to her face. She had forgotten that there were silver streaks in the blue of his iris – only his right eye - that glimmered like metal when the light hit it right. It was such a tiny detail, just one minuscule facet of the man who might be god, something she suspected not many people got to see up close, and she clung to it like a buoy.

She nudged his shoulder with her forearm, drawing his attention to the weapon cradled in her hands. He glanced down, a frown almost like confusion scrunching his brow before he held out his open palm. She deposited it there carefully, and when Rick’s long fingers folded around the metal, they gently grazed hers.

Morty didn’t mean to (and was honestly shocked to discover her eyes had any spare moisture left to give) but her eyes swam with tears that she desperately tried to hold in. She didn’t want to scare Rick away, she didn’t want to upset him or make him feel uncomfortable and she definitely didn’t want him to _leave_. If he wanted her to stand at his shoulder and watch him type, if that’s what it took to keep from watching his back disappear through another portal, she could suck up her tears and do it.

She refused to blink, positive that would break the dam, and her vision blurred until she was nearly blind. Rick’s chair creaked as he spun and she couldn’t make out the features of his face past her own tears – Rick was reduced to a spikey tuft of light blue, a pale stretch of skin streaked with shadows, and were the lines around his mouth deeper than usual or was that only the moisture in her eyes?

Was he was going to reprimand her, send her away, shot a portal and slip through without her? Was he disappointed in her over-emotional reaction? Was he bored with her stupidity? She was spiraling, black creeping in around the corners of her vision as she struggled to suck in air.

But then she felt the calloused brush of a palm against her cheek, the touch unmistakably his because she’d burned the feel of his hand into every inch of her skin.

Morty wasn’t entirely clear on what happened next but she was pretty sure some horrible, embarrassing sob rattled its way up her throat unbidden and Rick’s long arms wound around her waist pulling her into his warmth and he collapsed against it like her legs had turned to jelly.

When everything was settled, when her brief lapse of composure had tied itself off (even if tears were _still_ streaming down her cheeks) she was settled on his lap. Her head was tucked under his chin and her knees bent up to her chest. With his arms around her like this, it felt like he was hugging her whole body.

The thought only made her cry harder. Jeezus, she never wanted him to let go, she never wanted to be apart from him, she never wanted to see those blue eyes settle on her with that frigid, distant stare again.

It took her a long time to notice Rick was murmuring little shushing noises into her hair and the realization seemed to break the weeping spell she was under. She wasn’t a _little kid_ anymore. She was a Morty - _Rick’s_ Morty - and she was supposed to hold up better under pressure. So she laid a blanket over the quavering hole that had opened up inside her and only Rick could fill; determined to ignore it since it didn’t seem likely to go away anytime soon. She sniffled, wiped her nose on the inside of her shirt and took deep, stuttering breaths.

Rick was patting her head and seemingly content to let her wind herself down but she had to say _something_ to make sure he _knew_ she’d learned her lesson, something to make him stay. “I – I’ll never – Rick I’ll never leave you again,” she stammered between hiccups and his arms pressed her tighter, his hand combing through her hair.

For a long time he didn’t answer, seemingly content to run his hand over her hair gently and cradle her against his chest, the warmth and physical contact a blessed release from the days of isolation. Even long after he scooped her up, once she’d wrung out every tear left in her body and drifted into a dissociated fugue state, her mind exhausted after so much turmoil, her body content to loosen one muscle at a time, she still felt compelled to make him promises. “I swear Rick – _never_ again. Whatever you say, I’ll – I’ll do it. Forever.”

“I know, Morty,” he breathed and she didn’t bother repressing her shiver at the sliver of gratification in his voice. “I know.”

For a long time, Morty expected Rick to shoo her off. She kept herself tense – emotionally preparing herself for the moment he’d finally max out on her clinginess and tilt her off his lap.

Eventually, Rick turned the chair back towards his monitor and Morty let out a sigh figuring that was the hint, but he only shifted enough to scoot his keyboard closer to the edge of the desk where he could reach it with his arm still around her back, holding her up in the circle of his embrace as he tapped away at his computer.

Morty had no way of knowing how long they sat like that, Rick working and her soaking up his rare tenderness like dry soil would water. A long time. Maybe a lifetime. Not nearly long enough. But eventually she fell asleep. The rollercoaster of emotions had wrung the energy right out of her and drifting off on Rick’s lap, for the first time in _days_ , she actually slept – deeply, _soundly_ – and when she woke she had no memories of her dreams.


	6. Chapter Six

Morty woke back on the cot.

Briefly she wondered whether her time with Rick had been a delusion – if she was _finally_ cracking up and full-on hallucinating – but Rick’s computer terminal was still turned on, its screen glowing blue in the semi-darkness, lines of his program running past as it chugged away at whatever task Rick had set it.

The chair, which had been tucked neatly under the desk before his sudden appearance, was rolled out and facing her. It was too easy to imagine Rick sitting there and giving her that half-raised-eyebrow look that so perfectly expressed his disdain and subtle amusement.

Things had changed. The tension that had been tying her stomach up in knots had dissipated. Rick had accepted her apology but she was still in the bunker - still in the little prison that had been her whole world the last four days. What did that mean?

She sat up with a sigh, glaring at the line in the floor surrounding her corner, taping her fingers rhythmically against the bar of the cot.

She had to know. She had to test the limits of her collar – whether she _still_ was nothing but a prisoner or whether she had upgraded to… well – not exactly something much better (she ascertained with a glance at the closed hatch at the top of the ladder) but one with a little more range.

Thing was, the longer she held that little science experiment off, the longer she could pretend she _could_ walk out of her eight-by-six square jail cell if she so desired.

But that was the kind of hope that she didn’t want to let fester. Otherwise she’d spend all day (or night or whatever the fuck it was out in the real world) convincing herself that she had been good enough to make Rick happy, to earn a scrap of freedom, only to be bitterly disappointed when she discovered that wasn’t true.

The little tray robot sitting patiently at the edge of the line on the floor with another ration bar helped make it easy to pretend she _wasn’t_ testing the barrier, that she was only staggering over to accept the offering, and that it was an accident that she leaned a little too far – far enough to feel the familiar pull of metal around her neck as the collar stopped at the invisible barrier – because she was tired and clumsy and a little off balance.

So it was a good thing she hadn’t gotten her hopes up.

She tossed the bar under the cot to join the others, her appetite uninspired by the sandy-textured ration.

The last change she noticed in the bunker was that the countdown clock had been taken down, the blank wall left behind a meaningless stretch despite the fact that her eyes couldn’t help but track back to that spot over and over again, programmed to seek out that small assurance.

Its absence was a double-sided coin – it couldn’t torture her with its endless countdown anymore but it had been the only real connection to the outside world. A way to measure the passage of time. And without it, it was hard to say how long she laid staring blankly through the ceiling, trying to make sense of her fucked up life.

Morty had only been awake for a few hours (or what she _assumed_ was a few hours – it literally could have been minutes or days for all she could guess, boredom really messed with the drag of time) before the hatch _chink_ ed open and a patch of tungsten lighting brightened the dim bunker like sunlight breaking through a cloudy day. The extra vibrance was short lived – Rick’s thin frame slid onto the ladder, shrinking the square of light - and he slammed the latch closed over his head once he’d ducked down far enough.

The sight of him again so soon (she hadn’t even been awake long enough to get properly antsy) combined with the fact that he entered through the trapdoor and not a portal opened up a window of hope Morty hadn’t known she’d been searching for.

Because if he’d come in through the house - if it was just as easy for him to open up the trapdoor in the garage and climb down a ladder as it was to shoot a portal – maybe that meant he’d come _home_. Maybe he’d patched things over with Mom and dragged everyone into the soothing embrace of his presence and life was back to the (admittedly slightly screwed up) kind of normal the Smith house considered business as usual.

Rick might even be sleeping in his bedroom again and helping mom cook dinner and giving Summer drunken, unrequested love advice; all of that no more than thirty feet over her head.

(And if that were true, what Rick had told them about why the youngest Smith was MIA and whether they accepted his excuse blindly or with some reservations was a whole separate set of anxieties that flashed across her mind before she accepted that she _did not_ actually want to know any of that for fear it would completely shatter her.)

But Morty desperately clung to the possibility that Rick had come home. Even if she was still being punished for her mistake, mom and Summer _deserved_ to be off the hook.

Rick slid down the ladder with the same well-coordinated grace that constantly defied his age and when he hit the bottom, he shot Morty a look that wasn’t _entirely_ annoyed, which was pretty much his neutral expression.

The memory of her meltdown simmered like acid in her stomach and she fought to disregard the heat in her cheeks and the uncomfortably squirming of her insides. Rick didn’t deal well with her when she was emotional and she tried her best to keep her shit together – most of the time surprisingly successfully considering the stuff they got into – but something about the bunker was really starting to make her feel stretched too thin.

Rick kept his live-wire eyes glued to Morty as he paced to the worktable closest to her and leaned his hip against it, crossing his arms and tilting his neck until it cracked.

Determined to be normal, _determined to be good_ , (and not quite able to fight her natural impulse when Rick turned his attention to her), Morty rose to her feet and  quirked the corner of her mouth up in a smile even if he _was_ looking at her like she had done something wrong. “Hey, Rick.” She was actually impressed with how level her voice sounded. She didn’t even stutter. Halle – _fucking_ \- luiah.

“Morty,” he drawled and just from the shape of her name in his mouth, she knew he was frustrated with her. Though now that she had discovered a terrifying new height to Rick’s anger, the low level aggravation radiating from his flat eyebrow and half-lidded eyes was almost ordinary – a look he gave her at least twice a day.

“You think you’ve really got me pegged, huh _Mooorty_ ,” he finally broke the silence, after what felt like a miniature eternity. “What do you think you’re going to accomplish with some chi- _eeeeeugh_ -ildish display of – of protest? Cause let me tell you, it’s not working on me.” He plucked his flask from his breast pocket and unscrewed the cap, glaring at her while he took a long sip.

Morty blinked. Then blinked again, eyebrows scrunching up while she searched the ceiling for understanding. “I –” she started, wracking her brain for what part of her behavior could qualify as ‘ _protest_ ’ when all she’d done was stand, sit, or lay in her eight-by-five corner and alternatively sleep and space out. “I don’t - I haven’t -”

“Haven’t _what_ , Morty?” he snapped, interrupting her floundering. “Haven’t been eating?” Oh. _Ohhhhh_. He gesticulated a little wildly with his flask before taking another sip. “You thought you could manipulate me into _feeling bad_? No- _ooough-_ t gonna happen.”

“No, Rick, I just –” she inadvertently laughed, a little huff leaving her unexpectedly and she caught the way Rick’s pupils shrank to pinpricks, his irises a blue so cold she felt her skin frost up. _Her_? Manipulate _him_? _Yeah right_. Another laugh burbled out of her – more panicked sounding than she liked – and Rick brow dropped into a feral glare. “I just think they’re gross, is all. The ration bars, they taste like - I dunno - Snuffles’ old dog bed or something.” Rick’s frown had frozen on his face the way it usually did when something happened he hadn’t anticipated and Morty didn’t bother fighting off the smile that was threatening to consume her face.

Morty hadn’t noticed the tight line of his shoulders or the tension he’d been holding in his spine until it melted away. He slumped back against the worktable and dragged a hand down his face, breathing out a sigh and Morty let a wave of inappropriate euphoria buoy her spirits.

_Rick Sanchez_ didn’t _care about people._ But he was _worried._ About _her_.

He was a fucking god! There was nothing he couldn’t fix or manipulate or control. But here he was, trying to act all heartless and authoritarian while he was stewing over the fact that Morty hadn’t bothered to take more than few nibbles of her protein bars in the last couple days like it was a personal offense.

She shouldn’t have found that endearing – _jeez_ she really was fucked up – but her mouth kept on trying to twist into a smile.

“They aren’t supposed to taste good, Morty,” he grumbled from behind his palm, his eyes rolling as he slipped the flask back into his pocket. “They’re for survival – they’re meant to keep you from – _uuurp_ \- from starving to death or whatever.”

“Yeah,” Morty conceded, “Then I’ll wait ‘till I’m starving to eat them.”

He leveled her a glare but it entirely lacked heat; in fact it was much closer to the half-frustrated look he usually cut her when he found her amusing against his will. Morty liked that look - had really missed it for all its emotionally-constipated mixed signals – and this time when she chuckled a little bit, Rick joined in with a scoff that was somewhere between a laugh and a sigh.

He tapped at his watch before huffing, “Get over here,” flapping his hand towards her and holding out his arm like he usually did for her to slide under. Morty, moderately confident now that he wouldn’t make her choke herself out just for shits and giggles, hurried quickly across the invisible barrier and to his side where he pulled her into his embrace with a familiarity that ached.

She pressed her cheek briefly to his chest, inhaling the smell of solder and oil and _Rick_ that clung to his lab coat like cologne. Jeez, would she ever get enough of it?

“You’re fucking spoiled, Morty, you know that? I fucking spoil you. I _should_ let you starve.” She quirked up an eyebrow at that, tilting her head up to catch the fond look he was bearing down at her, his words completely at odds with the doting way he ruffled her hair. “You’re lucky I happen to have a craving for yim sum.”

“What – do you mean _dim sum_?” Morty asked, her voice hitching when Rick swooped down and caught her around the waist, hoisting her up to sit on the worktable. He lifted half his eyebrow at her and with his arms still around her waist, his face close, and his live-wire eyes burning holes through hers, she felt the pull of the universe shift until it dipped to hold nothing but the two of them.

“ _Pssssh_. Not to shit all over pot stickers, but yim sum could fuck their dumpling asses ten ways from Sunday. Fuck, yim sum’s _jizz_ would be a five star meal on earth, Morty. People would be crawling all over each other just to lick the box they come in, that’s how good yim sum is.”  

Morty rolled her eyes and laughed. It wasn’t until she heard herself ask, “O – Oh yeah, Rick?” in a goading tease that she realized they were talking to each other normally. Despite everything. Despite the bunker. Despite the incarceration. Despite the quick fuck, immediate abandonment, and the subsequent tear fest. They picked up right where they left off.

“Yeah, _Mo-_ ouuuuugh- _rty_ ,” Rick belched, shooting a portal into the open air beside him, the top half of him disappearing briefly before he pulled back with a trapezoidal cardboard box in hand and a cocky smirk quirking up the corner of his lips.

Yim sum turned out to be finger food – actually Morty wasn’t sure whether yim sum referred to the animal or plant they were made from or the dish itself – but Rick let Morty crack open the container to unveil a pile of crispy round things. They looked a little like tater tots except their insides were pale pink, but the golden brown, seemingly deep fried shell was familiar.

Rick watched her somewhat ravenously when she plucked one from the proffered box and bit into it. The texture was strange and shattered into fractals when it made contact with Morty’s teeth and Morty pressed a hand over her lips in surprise. Before she’d been across the multiverse that might have seemed like a bad thing but instead it only enhanced the experience.

And they _were_ good. So good she teared up a little at the overwhelming rush of chemicals trying to articulate ‘ _fuck that’s delicious_ ’ to her brain by way of as many neurons as she could spare.

Rick smirked triumphantly before he tossed one up in the air and caught it in his mouth, his throat rumbling with a laugh. “What’d I tell you, Morty?”

With her legs crossed underneath her and Rick crowding her space and insisting that she try one dipping sauce after another (his favorite was murky green and bubbling; hers was a runny, iridescent slime that tasted exactly like walking out of school on the first day of summer felt), Morty could almost pretend everything was back to normal.

Rick certainly was. Or at least he seemed to be. His hip was braced against the counter at her knee and he kept making Morty try to find words to describe all the strange tastes only to laugh or argue vehemently when she’d eventually stutter something out.

Between bites and rounds of laughter, he kept his broad palm spanned across her knee or her thigh or her shoulder and Morty let herself briefly pretend that she wasn’t still sitting under the only humming light in the bunker. How many times had they done this in the kitchen in the middle of the day, returning home famished after an adventure and sneaking snacks while Summer was at school and mom was at work? How often had he dragged her out to a Chinese restaurant in a dimension where shark was the most prominent source of protein, or to an alien bar that served vegetables that glowed, or to that island planet with shellfish that sang while they were being eaten, the vibrations of their voices echoing all the way down to Morty’s stomach?

It felt so normal. Or well – _their_ version of normal.

When Morty couldn’t eat another bite and told Rick so (even though he kept insisting she finish the last three) she leaned back on the counter and tried not to let the dregs of despair sour the first hint of happiness she’d had in days. Since she’d come down the ladder into the bunker – maybe even since she’d turned over and fallen asleep on his chest the night he signed her permission form – she hadn’t been so at peace with the shape of the world, and she didn’t want her stupid anxiety to ruin it for her.

Watching her with pale eyes too-smart to be fooled by her paltry acting skills, Rick stilled, his pupils dilating, almost _recalibrating_ and Morty tensed but he only tilted his flask up to his lips, shaking out the last drops onto his tongue.

The trepidation that had tingled on the back of her neck like a shiver smoothed away when Rick cradled her jaw, tucking his fingers into the hair behind her ear and swiping his thumb along her cheekbone. Morty leaned into the touch with a quavering sigh, her own hands jumping up to cradle his palm against her face, to press it against her harder, to sear his fingerprints into her skin. She steadied her nerve and decided to be daring, pressing her lips to the thin skin of his wrist, opening her eyes to watch Rick’s fascinated expression sharpen into thoughts too complex to read.

She wanted to know when he’d let her out of the bunker – because despite her obvious unintelligence, it hadn’t escaped her notice that in all their meal together, not once did he say _anything_ about what adventure they might go on tomorrow – something he almost always kept rambling on about even if they never actually stuck to a plan.

But ( _as always_ ) something on her face must have given her away.

“You have to learn your lesson, Morty,” Rick breathed against her mouth, answering the question she never asked while his forehead pressed against hers. Two glinting eyes bore into her only inches away, their gaze straight and all-seeing, even if her vision went halfway-crossed just trying to meet his glare. “You forced my hand.”

“Rick, _I swear_ -”

“Promises aren’t good enough, Morty.” Rick’s hand dragged up her arm and left a trail of sparks in its wake. “I need to _know_.” His hand fisted in the hair at the nape of her neck, tilting her head until their noses slid next to each other. “ _I need to be sure_.”

And then his mouth was pressed against hers, his tongue pushing past her lips and rolling with hers, teasing the roof of her palate and toying with her full bottom lip.

Morty moaned, the sound deep and resonating in Rick’s open mouth. She didn’t remember making the choice to move but suddenly she was _plastered_ against him, arms and legs wrapped around his waist like she could lock him in place with her embrace. One hand found his coarse hair and the other snuck under his lab coat and sweater to trail her fingers along the skin of his back.

She could have died like that, could have spontaneously combusted leaving behind nothing but her two bare feet and it wouldn’t have surprised her. She was _ravenous_ for his affection and after so long without it, his kiss felt like a confession.

Despite her attempts to rock against him, to press her core to the prominent bulge she felt through his pants, Rick’s hand held fiercely to her hips keeping her still, his mouth widening in a smile even as they kissed.

“Ah ah ah, Morty,” he tutted, pulling away while she chased him with her lips. “Not now.” His half-lidded eyes and almost flushed cheeks told her it wasn’t lack of interest holding him back. Especially when his gaze dropped to the collar and the thin visible line of electric blue iris was totally eclipsed by black pupil.

“Why not now?” Morty demanded, her tone more breathy and pleading that she’d intended and a rolling chuckle leaked out behind the hand Rick raised to cover his mouth. The raging fire inside her dimmed significantly when Rick titled his wrist to glance at his watch, her heart dropping into the acidic pit of her stomach.

“I’ve g- _ooooough-_ ot places to be, bud.” He must have noticed the way her entire body tightened around him because he calmly starting shushing her, patting her hair and leaning in to kiss her temple. “Come here.”

He wrapped his arms under her but and hoisted her up like she weighed nothing and for a brief moment she was hopeful.

Then she realized he was walking her back to the corner, back to the cot, back to her little prison, and it was a struggle to fight off the tears that blurred her vision. She could fight him – she had a sudden mental image of her kicking and screaming and squirming as he wrestled her to the cot and her stomach flopped in misplaced insterest – but Rick _always_ got his way and she’d only be delaying the inevitable.

When he set her down on the old camp bed, he bent to one knee in front of her and brushed the hair out of her face. She didn’t mean to say it – she’d been fighting desperately to lock the words inside her mouth – but they burbled out her unbidden. “P - Please don’t – don’t go.” Of course her stutter was worse than ever. As if she wasn’t humiliated enough.

“I can’t stay,” he repeated softly, his words kind but his eyes bright and intense while he reached for his flask and frowned when he felt the empty weight of it. “But don’t worry, Morty, I’ll be back. _I_ won’t forget about you.” Mort didn’t miss the emphasis he’d placed on the ‘I’ and for the millionth time, her mind wandered back to mom and Summer and what they could possibly think of her disappearance. But it wasn’t exactly news that Rick was the only one around who actually cared about her. Even if being on the receiving end of (his affection? his favoritism? his possessiveness?) was a lot to handle. “So just sit tight and wait for grandpa to come back.”

She might have protested, she was already opening her mouth to argue back, but then he leaned in for a kiss, this one slow and deep - the kind of kiss he almost _never_ gave her – and all the argument in her body melted out the soles of her feet.

Usually he was all sloppy tongued and hair pulling and hardly getting a chance to catch her breath; harsh teeth and panting and a fervor like he was trying to suck her soul out her mouth.

Kneeling before her, leaning his weight into her, his calloused hand gently cradling her jaw, it was like he wanted to counteract all his cruelty with the softness of his lips alone – and Morty hated how well it was working on her.

His mouth was more supple than it had ever been before, and for a long time he simply traced the seam of her lips with little butterfly caresses, paying special attention to the corners of her mouth. It made no sense how hard her heart was pounding, how suddenly _desperate_ she felt when his slight stubble brushed against her cheek while his lips molded themselves to hers. It was _devastatingly_ erotic and he hadn’t even licked his way inside yet.

She could feel his eyelashes against her cheekbone. She breathed in the small, almost-content sigh he exhaled against her face. There were a million nerve endings following the soft line he traced over her pulse point with his thumb.

When he pulled away, Morty was embarrassingly wet and so past the point of reason that she didn’t care how needy or wonton she seemed when she keened – clinging to the lapels of his lab coat and pulling him back. He chuckled against her mouth, leaving her with one more chaste peck before he rolled to his feet and stepped back, tapping at his watch.

She was still trying to catch her breath, her mouth open and panting while it took every ounce of self-control just to keep from throwing herself at him – but even she had noticed his feet rested firmly on the solid metal panels outside of her eight-by-six foot cell.

The glint in his eyes suggested he was kind of hoping she’d try anyways but she was determined not to give him the satisfaction. Though she wasn’t above leaning back against the wall and pointedly spreading her legs, her own fingers tracing patterns on her thighs.

Rick’s smug eyes turned searing but he dragged the back of his wrist over his chin and backed up another pace.

“That’ll give you something to think about while I’m gone, Morty,” he rumbled and she didn’t even get a chance to do something truly pathetic (like beg) before he dug out his portal gun from his pocket and disappeared through the swirl of green he shot under his feet, his eyes pinned to her until his head slipped out of sight.

Morty - unable to resist the temptation – ran her hand over her underwear, rubbing herself faintly through the fabric. The shock from her collar was expected though no less startling.

Morty rolled over, buried her face in the blankets, and screamed.

 

* * *

 

Even without the clock on the wall to count it down, time still stretched on. Probably. It _was_ a lot harder to tell how much time was passing, trapped in the eternal dim glow of the bunker. It didn’t help that the routine had subtly shifted – for the better, to be sure – but Morty’s concept of time withered and then blew away almost completely.

Her sleep schedule slowly morphed from extended rests to shorter, more frequent naps. Hunger hit her at odd times or sometimes not at all. And Morty’s periods had always been irregular at best and _non-existent_ since Rick and her started fooling around. She suspected he’d added some kind of birth-control to her randomly administered inoculations but hadn’t bothered asking about her lack of a monthly cycle. After all, it wasn’t like she missed it.

And what did it matter what time it was outside in the real world anyways? Was that world even _real_ anymore? Morty let those sorts of thoughts flicker over the pool of her mind like dragonflies, never alighting, just skirting the edges of her periphery.

Happily, she wasn’t _always_ alone anymore. Rick would come in and out, sometimes by portal, sometimes by way of the trapdoor and ladder – seemingly with no clear routine or schedule. Sometimes she’d lay alone for what felt like most of a day, other times he’d stay with her for so long she’d wake up and fall asleep in his presence. Occasionally, he’d stopped in for an hour, leave again for a few minutes only to come right back.

Despite his irregular visits, he was unanimously _nice_. Nicer that he’d ever been with any consistency. Sometimes almost _sweet_ – a word she would have _never_ used to describe Rick Sanchez, not even when he was drunk and affectionate; not even when the device that was supposed to build them exoskeletons based on their genetic makeup accidentally turned their blood to sugar syrup and they’d nearly died of hyperglycemia.

And even though at first it borderline-scared her, she quickly learned to close her eyes and lean into it.

He let her sit on his lap while he tinkered with projects. He brought her food from all over the multiverse, things she’d never tasted before and likely never would again. When his hand got tangled up in her knotty hair, he didn’t bitch at her like he might have if the same thing happened up in her bedroom – instead he came back with a brush and combed it out himself with hands entirely too gentle – hands so careful and soft as they wove her hair into a long plait that tears crusted the corners of her eyes.

It was weird. It was _good_ but it was _weird._

She was given free reign of the bunker when he was present – another sliver of freedom Morty cherished like a love letter – but he still shuffled her off to her corner every time he had to leave. She carefully didn’t complain – if she didn’t complain, he’d kneel down on the floor in front of where she sat and kiss her. Deeply. _Longingly._ In a way that felt like he didn’t want to leave either. And from a man who mostly seemed to tolerate her kisses except for when they were mid-fuck… well… it was like discovering a new language.

But they never did anything past kissing and – considering the fact that since their first time screwing around half a year ago (his fingers buried inside her, his body pining her to her bedroom door), hardly twenty-four hours had passed without some kind of hook-up – Morty was working her way towards going _actually_ crazy for how horny she was. She couldn’t do anything about it herself without being electrocuted (she had tried once anyways and she might have gotten off on it anyways if it the voltage didn’t significantly increase every time it needed to repeat itself) and she was fairly sure Rick kept winding her up on purpose.

He’d brush the inside of her thighs with the backs of his fingers or rumble his directions into the shell of her ear. He put her in his lap and let her grind down on the bulge in his pants but only enough to get her frantic, to make her desperate – then he’d hold her still and make her beg and plead, only to sooth away her needy tears with gentle kisses until she calmed. Then he’d start the whole process over again.

As a result of all that, Morty’s head was filled with nothing but Rick.

She spent the hours of his absence fantasizing about his hands. About his lips. About his dick. _Jeez_ , his fucking dick. The things he could do with that thing. It was driving her wild.

When would he come back? When he did, would he nibble along her shoulder while he taped away at his keyboard? Or would he hand feed her dinner, sliding his fingers along her tongue until she licked them clean?

She was going crazy. She already _was_ crazy. She’d completely lost her mind.

Morty tried her best to tempt him into fucking her. Jeezus, did she ever try. But it wasn’t like she was particularly _sexy_ and Rick had been around the multiverse long enough to know that a little too well. If she thought about it too hard (and generally she actively avoided doing that), she had _no_ fucking idea why he was interested in her in the first place. And it wasn’t like she was used to being the aggressor; Rick was usually the one to instigate and normally if she looked at him with just a _fraction_ of interest, he’d pounce.

But in the bunker, he pried her hands away when she reached for his zipper and even though he groaned and covered her neck in hickeys when she whispered, “ _Fuck me, Rick_ ,” he never obeyed her desperate pleas.

She almost got him once – honestly she was little proud of herself for the tortured look of anger Rick had pulled out on that memorable occasion – but almost wasn’t enough.

Despite her obvious inadequacies, Morty had been with Rick long enough to know he liked her docile, liked her _obedient_ , liked to feel dominant and all powerful and in control. So when she’d been sitting alone in the bunker for what felt like a few hours, passing the time tracing circles on the skin of her stomach and writhing in frustration, an idea flashed into her brain like a stroke of lightning.

She peeled off her utilitarian tank top and panties and kneeled down at the edge of the barrier, hands resting lightly on her thighs and eyes downcast. She’d seen some of the porn Rick watched. Sometimes he’d show her when he was drunk. Make her lean up on her elbows and watch people (or sometimes groups of people) have sex while he buried his fingers inside of her. She knew what it meant to be submissive, had gleaned enough from the way the young women in those videos behaved; the way they prostrated themselves before their ‘masters’ or whatever – usually an older man – that Morty had cobbled together something of his tastes.

So she waited for Rick; naked, kneeling, and collared.

She felt ridiculous – jeez, was that anything new? – but she was _desperate_. Her skin was practically crawling with heat and she couldn’t shake the restless, discontent storm brewing in the pit of her stomach. Those kisses were fucking with her, the ones that made her think… that sometimes maybe _seemed_ like Rick might… that it wasn’t just _sex_ but… _her_ …

No, that was _impossible_ and if he didn’t fuck her soon, she was going to let her imagination get the best of her.

When Rick slid down the ladder probably less than an hour later, his casual, “Morty, you wouldn’t believe the shit I just saw –” was cut short the moment he came around the workbench and spotted her. With her eyes glued to the floor, it was hard to read his expression but the heavy breath he exhaled through his nose and the audible cracking of his knuckles when his fists clenched told Morty he wasn’t unaffected.

“What do you think you’re doing, Morty,” he murmured, his voice black denim and dark clouds.

“Waiting for you, grandpa,” she answered quickly. She had given a lot of thought to calling him ‘sir’ like the girls in Rick’s videos tended to but she already knew what using his familial title did to him, the nasty old perv. It was one of her most formidable weapons against his resolve – one she didn’t use often because _she_ wasn’t the biggest fan of that aspect of their relationship - but he had pushed her to play a little dirty.

Sure enough, he huffed out another quavering breath at the name.

He paced towards her, his steps even and precise and Morty held her breath.

His black shoes stopped in front of her knees within her line of sight. He stood there for what had to be minutes, silently contemplating her while her heartbeat spiked high enough she worried the organ might actually just pop. She felt the heat of his gaze on her shoulders and the top of her head down to her heaving breasts and perked nipples. It took all her effort to keep her fingers from twitching into fists.

When his hand brushed against her hair, she startled but didn’t jerk away. His nails scraped along her scalp, burying his fingers in her untidy waves and dragging her face forward, pressing her cheek against his clothed crotch. She could feel the hard length of him through his pants, could almost smell the musk of him and the hair at the nape of her neck prickled in anticipation.

She parted her lips and turned her head and let the open juncture of her mouth drag along the entirety of his clothed length.

He released her so suddenly she almost toppled over and he huffed out an aggravated chuckle. “Ni- _eeeeoug-_ ice try, Morty,” he growled and she cut her eyes up in time to see the frustration he shuttered hard with a façade of disinterest. The fact that it wasn’t just _her_ losing her mind for wanting him was reassuring and infuriating at the same time.

He readjusted himself, notably palming the bulge tenting his slacks before grabbing her by the bicep and dragging her to her feet. “Guess you get to help me build a neutrino bomb naked,” he groused but it was obvious from his tone he wasn’t complaining.

And that was the closest she got to something – _anything_ – even remotely sexual since he’d bent her against the wall and fucked her. If Morty had a way to tell time, she’d be keeping track of the hours; and if she was as smart and as cruel and as omnipotent as Rick, she’d be tempted to torture him back.

Then again, with how pent up she was, it was more likely that if she ever gained the upper hand, she’d wrap herself around him like a second skin and wear him for days.

Time trickled by slowly when she was alone and sped past in a blur when Rick was there. He rarely mentioned what he did with his day, never hinted where he was going when he’d glance at his watch and scurry up the ladder only to reappear through a portal minutes later. For all Morty knew, the world was lost to nuclear fallout and her and Rick were the only ones left behind. It wasn’t a bad fantasy to play out in her head. It made her feel less fucked up for already forgiving him for locking her up and excused how much less her mind had been wandering to mom and Summer.

In fact, she was fairly sure _days_ had passed with few thoughts besides the ones that circled around Rick and what she’d do to his naked body if he ever let her get the chance when she was suddenly, painfully reminded of the world she had nearly forgotten.

Morty was pacing when Rick slid down the ladder shooting her a smirk and a greeting and a, “Just here for my scre- _eeeugh-_ wdriver, Morty.” He left the trap door open and Morty blinked against the strange brightness of something that looked like daylight filtering into the gloom of the bunker.

She was still squinting and working out what she might say to keep him a little longer when she heard it, surprisingly close, slithering through the open hatch and echoing around the metal walls of the bunker like something foreign: _Summer’s voice._

“Grandpa, come on, we’re gonna be late!” Summer called and Morty felt all the breath whoosh out of her in a silent gasp. Her sister was there – _right there –_ she couldn’t be more than twenty feet away for how clear Morty could hear the shape of her exasperation. Summer was _right there._

If Morty screamed, _if she shouted out_ , Summer would _hear_ her.

Rick cut hard eyes to her – challenging eyes – and if looks were tangible things, the place their eyes met would be sparking like a live wire.

Morty swallowed and carefully rolled her lips into her mouth – a wordless promise to keep quiet. The slow grin that curled up the corners of Rick’s mouth was something feral and terrifying but his eyes – jeezus his eyes screamed something tender that licked up her insides like fire.

He stared at her unblinkingly when he raised his voice to shout back, “Be right there, Sum Sum,” and Morty felt unsteady on her feet.

Rick’s gait was quick and rolling when he covered the ground between them and captured her mouth in a kiss that nearly bowled her over – and probably would have if the wall wasn’t at her back to catch her fall. And it was a good thing his lips were so tightly sealed to hers because the moan that crawled up her throat when he slipped two fingers past the hem of her underwear and straight into her was louder than she meant it to be.

He pulled away from her ferocious looking and bright-eyed. He slapped a hand over her mouth and pumped his fingers, curving them _just right_ to make the black behind her eyelids explode into colors, her legs already weak and trembling. She was so pent up – so starved for sexual attention - that _she_ exploded when he pressed his thumb to her clit, his palm muffling the sound of an orgasm long overdue while he watched her fall apart with something fierce and wild burning in the blue of his eyes.

His hands were gentle when he lowered her to the cot, her feet no longer steady enough to hold her up. He kissed her hair softly, whispered, “That’s it buddy, that’s my good girl,” into her ear, and slipped up the ladder, staring at her with something almost like _glee_ until he vanished out the trap door.

It _thunk_ ed closed heavily behind him, closing her in with nothing but her own breathy panting to break the silence.

Morty ached with regret for hours after, wondering if she should have called out to Summer. She comforted herself with the thought that it would have been useless; Rick would have some way to talk his way out of it, to explain why Morty was sitting in her underwear in a secret underground bunker under the garage. Then she hated herself even more for finding comfort in that futility.

But the longer she dwelled on it, the more she accepted that she’d probably done the right thing – _the thing Rick_ wanted _her to do_ – and doing what Rick wanted was what she was good at. Generally, it was the _only_ thing she was good at. Besides, the reward had been worth it. She was still boneless and foggy headed from cumming so unexpectedly after fucking forever kept chaste.

Besides, disobeying Rick - _disappointing_ Rick - never led to anything good.

He had her wrapped around his finger and Morty tried to fill that hole in her stomach with the knowledge that she would do it all the same if she got a second chance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How low can we go?


	7. Chapter Seven

Rick never brought up what happened (or rather _didn’t_ happen) that day Morty heard Summer through the open hatch.

Morty didn’t either, _obviously_. What the fuck was she supposed to say? ‘Remember that time I could of made a scene and gotten the fuck out of the bunker but instead I came around your fingers like a trained slut’? Yeah, no thanks. Though she thought about it often enough. Especially since he seemed no more inclined to repeat the part of it Morty actually liked – the orgasm – than he was before the incident.

Rick came and went another handful of times. He tinkered with his computer, built something huge and mechanical while holding out his hand for tools, and brought her McDonald’s breakfast (the first hint Morty had at the time of day in the outside world except she had been awake for hours at the time so it didn’t feel anything like morning to her).

After a particularly long break without him – one in which she paced and slept and showered and re-bit the ragged edges of her nails to stubs and paced again – the _whoosh_ of a portal stalled her worrying and he stepped through with purpose written in the lines of his face.

When he tossed her clothes – one of her favorite yellow t-shirts and the blue skirt Summer had bought for her – she knew something was different. Her heartrate skyrocketed, shaking hands holding up the bundle of fabric like she didn’t recognize what she was looking at.

“Get dressed,” Rick ordered and Morty snapped back to herself, obediently tugging the tank over her head and relishing the familiar feel of worn cotton. The waft of scent – the smell of her bedroom – made her eyes a little watery but she blinked that away before she yanked herself free of the head hole. She tugged the skirt up her legs and struggled a bit with the zipper under Rick’s watchful gaze but eventually she was dressed. For the first time in… jeez Morty didn’t even know how long. A fucking lifetime.

Rick scanned her top to bottom – an appraisal not at all uncommon – and jerked his head, urging her to his side. “Come on,” he whispered, the weight of his hand landing on the back of her neck as he pushed her through a portal.

She had to squint her eyes shut when she stepped out with bare feet onto cold, smooth cement. After so long in the dim bunker, the late evening sunlight was blinding to her dark-adjusted eyes and tears sprang up unbidden as she struggled to take in her surroundings. But she didn’t need to open her eyes to know where she was: the oil/ozone tang, the heady scent of Rick’s whiskey, and the faint smell of cut grass told her she was in the garage.

Morty still couldn’t pry her eyes all the way open by the time Rick guided her forward a few steps and pushed her down onto the stool she so frequently occupied before she’d been locked up in the bunker.

The wood felt unreal under her fingers where she gripped the seat in a white knuckled clench, desperate to ground herself or maybe just trying to hold herself steady as that strange vertigo feeling hit again and the world nearly tilted away from her.

“You’re alright, buddy,” Rick reassured her, his hand on her back supporting her as she adjusted to a room that felt too big, too bright, _too much_. She couldn’t open her eyes without squinting but she still tilted her head back to center herself with the carefully neutral look Rick was shooting her out of the corner of his eyes as he sipped from his flask. “You got it?”

“Y – yeah, Rick,” she answered automatically, not at _all_ sure if she ‘ _had it_ ’ but desperate to appease him. “’M fine.”

His hand drifted to her shoulder squeezing once before he pulled away and it took all Morty’s willpower to stay upright without his hand bracing her. She pulled it off with only the slightest waver. Rick seated himself at the worktable without a backwards glance and Morty fought the pull of gravity that suddenly felt too strong.

Her heartrate was going bonkers and if she didn’t start counting out her breaths, she was going to begin hyperventilating. Inhale: one, two, three – the garage door out to the driveway was open, early summer humidity slinking into the cool space of Rick’s workshop and making the air Morty was so carefully breathing thick. Exhale: one, two, three – the neighbor from a block over, the one with the Pomeranian, walked past on the sidewalk across the street, loudly talking into the phone pressed to his ear.

Maybe it was the sight of that neighbor or maybe it was the influx of much needed oxygen to her brain but Morty was suddenly struck anew by the thought: she was _finally_ out of the bunker.

It felt unreal. Like her mind was tricking her, feeding all this sensory detail to her as a joke. She’d had _dreams_ that were more convincing; ones that blurred less around the edges and where she could focus on the colorful gadgets lining Rick’s shelf without her heart racing. But paradoxically, she _knew_ it was really happening – that she was sitting in the garage watching Rick work like it was any other day. She could feel the muggy heat and smell the burnt metal of whatever Rick was soldering and hear the cicadas just starting to _whir_ as the sun set.

Anxiety boiled hot and fast in the back of her throat.

Her self-hatred found a new low when a thought bubbled up unbidden: she wanted to go back to the bunker. The bunker was safe while this - this was _too much_. She was fairly sure her heart wouldn’t be able to take it. She was a burn wound and this was the heat of a fire licking at skin that too easily remembered pain.

Morty was only able to keep herself together because she turned her focus to Rick with a fanaticism that bordered insanity.

The stiff set of his shoulders told her he was just as tense as she was though he was trying hard to pretend otherwise. The way his head tilted slightly towards her even as he worked on some delicate looking motherboard said he was giving her most of his attention. The way he balanced his weight on the edge of his seat, his legs taught underneath him, meant he was ready to spring up and into action at a seconds notice.

Focusing on his hands while they made quick work of connecting delicate wires and plugging in chips was centering. How often had she watched those hands work? A hundred time? A thousand? Their movements were familiar and graceful. Morty breathed out a long sigh she hadn’t realized she’d been holding and her heart finally started to slow its rapid pounding against her ribcage.

 _It was just the garage_. She was over-reacting, as usual. She’d been in there a million times, there was no need to _freak out_. It seemed… bigger and more intimidating… than it ever had before but whatever. She was _fine._

She tried not to look too hard at the smaller, unfamiliar spaceship parked next to Rick’s in the driveway. Or the graduation cap tassel hanging from its rearview mirror. Or what it meant that Summer had both graduated high school _and_ turned eighteen in the time Morty had been in the bunker because that would mean Morty had been down there for – yeah, no, she definitely shouldn’t think about that…

Cause more than a month was – it hadn’t _felt_ like… and if the world went on without her for that long…

Morty needed Rick. She needed him to be touching her, grounding her, _steadying_ her, and she needed that _now_. Or else she was for sure going to pass out. Or maybe start screaming. Hell, maybe both, one and then the other.

She stumbled to her feet and she didn’t miss the way Rick froze, going still as a statue as her stool clattered over in her hurry. She cantered over to him on extremely weak legs and wrapped her arms around his shoulders from behind, leaning too much of her weight against his back while she buried her face in his neck.

The tension leaked out of him, one hand rising up to stroke soothingly along her forearm. His other kept soldering, even as he rubbed at the top of her head with his cheek. “You okay, bud?” he asked and Morty was so tightly plastered to him she could feel the words rumble up his chest and through his throat. “You wanna go back down to the bunker?”

So much of her wanted to say yes but she knew she was being ridiculous. She wanted to sleep in her own bed. And go on adventures. And see another human being besides Rick.

She shook her head tightly in the hollow where his neck met his shoulder and squeezed her arms around him tighter. It was easier to calm down with her eyes pressed closed against his skin; the light was so much less overwhelming. And the familiar smell of Rick was comforting – that hint of soap and salt and alcohol reminding her of strong, wiry arms and drifting off to sleep.

She breathed the scent in deeply, centering herself around it, trying to empty herself of every thought and emotion except the sensory input coming in through her nose.

Rick tolerated her clinginess, shifting only slightly so he could go back to his work while she tried to burrow under his skin and live there. A year ago she never would have dared attach herself so tightly to him, even if she was half out of her mind with terror and they were in a safe enough place to have a meltdown, but one thing she’d learned since their relationship changed was that Rick – despite his prickly personality – actually kind of _liked_ being the person she sought out for comfort. At least, sometimes it kind of seemed that way.

Slowly her arms relaxed, her hold becoming less of a death clutch and more an actual hug. Her fists unclenched and without really thinking about it, one of her hands found their way into the collar of his shirt, her palm laying flush with the skin of his chest.

She thoughtlessly huffed out a sigh along the column of his throat and if it weren’t for how close she was, she might have missed the rumbling hum he growled out in response.

And if Morty though she was fucked up for having a full-on anxiety attack just for walking into the garage, that was nothing to how much she hated herself for the spike of heat that coiled hot and low in her stomach at the sound of Rick’s barely there moan.

She turned her head, her nose trailing gently up the curve of his neck and the room and the open garage door and all the intimidating open space of the outdoors vanished when her attention hyper-focused in on the little huff that Rick exhaled out his open mouth. She nosed her way up to the shell of his ear, her lips parting to breathe hot, wet air against his earlobe and she was immediately rewarded with Rick’s low humming groan. Morty felt it in her stomach, stuttering a quiet moan in response, directly against his aural canal.

His hands were still working but he tilted his neck ever so slightly, just enough to give her a little more access to the thin skin behind his ear. “What are you doing, Morty,” Rick chided, but instead of answering, Morty nuzzled back to the place his neck met his shoulder, pushing the collar of his lab coat and sweater out of the way so she could sink her teeth into his skin. Her eyes squinted open in time to watch a noticeable bulge in his slacks twitch. When she sucked lightly, laving it with her tongue, the bulge jerked again.

“I – I need a distraction, Rick,” she whispered, uncomfortably aware of how desperate she sounded. 

“You haven’t earned it yet, Morty,” he growled back, hands still determinedly at work even while the firm shape in his pants grew more pronounced.

“I didn’t mean –” Morty started and then decided it might be better to _show_ him since she was fairly sure she’d never be able to get the words out through the lump still lodged in her throat. And if she could make Rick happy and remind him of how much he liked her company, maybe he wouldn’t put her back in the bunker so soon. She felt miserably exposed and anxious and out of place above-ground but the logical part of her brain knew that if she had to go back to her corner – if she had to spend another day down in the dark now that she’d seen the sunlight – she would completely loose her mind.

She leaned up and grabbed hold of the back of Rick’s swivel chair, pulling him back until she had enough space to slither into the small gap under his desk between the stack of drawers on each end holding the tabletop up. She braced a hand on his knees, her own digging into the cement floor in a way that would certainly hurt very soon but it was worth it when Rick raised half his unibrow in a look that was _almost_ surprise.  

His legs spread just the tiniest bit and his eyes held her steady in a tractor-beam gaze. “Like I said, _you haven’t earned it_ ,” he bit out, his voice low and soft and heated. But Morty knew all the varying shades of Rick’s ‘no’s and it sounded like he wanted to be convinced.

“ _Please_ , Rick,” she urged, an unintentional sliver of her actual anxiety coating her words. The space between Rick’s legs was safer, more confined and half crouched under his desk, the sunlight was much less blinding. His knees opened just a little more, just enough for Morty to scoot between them and press her cheek to his inner thigh, her mouth _inches_ from the hard lump starting to tent his pants. “I – I want to make you feel good.”

He scowled down at her but with her face pressed so close to his groin, she felt the roll of his hips beneath her head. Encouraged, she scooted closer, her hands slinking up the outside of his thighs while she rubbed her nose against the tip of his bulge, heat and moisture pooling between her legs. He was so hard. _She_ had made him that hard. Something vicious and possessive crystalized in her stomach like hard candy and she looked up at him from underneath her eyelashes trying to sear him with her gaze alone.

“ _Beg me_ , Morty,” he half whispered/half growled, his eyes ecstasy bright and unblinking while he watched her smooth her cheek along the length of his covered dick.

She always felt so awkward when she tried dirty talk – nothing like Rick whose mouth she swore was _designed_ to say the filthiest things and make them sound like poetry. But she was too keyed up to care, the reason behind her pounding heart getting muddled up as her cunt clenched around nothing. “Let me suck it, Rick. Let - let me gag on your thick cock.” She ran her mouth along the firm bulge of him and one of his hands buried itself in her hair. “I wanna _taste_ you, Rick, _please_ ,” she mumbled against his erection, closing her eyes when Rick held her in place while he thrust once, slowly against her cheek. “It’s been so long.”

His mouth stretched in a grin and she was suddenly unsure whether she had him where she wanted or if it was the other way around.

“I’m in the middle of something,” he reminded her calmly, his hips rolling up until her lips parted and she breathed a hot gush of air onto his head through the fabric of his pants.

“You don’t – Who said you have to stop?” Morty asked, her fingers following the waistband of his slacks and popping the button of his fly. Rick didn’t stop her so she slowly dragged the zip down, the sound deafening even over Rick’s heavy panting.

“Jeezus, you’re fucking perfect, Morty,” he growled and an uncomfortable bubble of happiness made her chest ache. There was _no way_ he meant it but then again, Rick didn’t make a habit of saying things he didn’t mean. And no one else had ever said anything half as nice as the shit Rick muttered under his breath when Morty got him off. It was… addicting (to say the least). “You wanna suck your grandpa off while he’s working?” Morty nodded, carefully slipping a hand inside his pants and underwear to work his erection out through his fly.

“I want – I’m gonna make your hands shake, Rick. I want to make you as crazy as I feel.” His eyes rolled up in his head when she’d finally freed him from his slacks, her hand loose as it circled him and dragged down, tip to base, his skin smooth and soft and searing hot. “I want –” she cut herself off, a wave of arousal threatening to carry her away, “- I want to see if you can keep your focus when my lips are wrapped around your cock.”

“ _Fuck_ ,” he exhaled, ragged and filthy and so _so_ hot. “Get under there Morty,” he urged, scooting his chair forward and caging her in the small alcove under the desk between his long legs and a mess of tangled wires hanging over the back edge of the desk. After the wide open, exposed feeling of the garage, it felt better to be boxed in by wood and floor and wall and Rick’s body even if the space was cramped and smelled like hot copper and varnish. “You talk a big game but let’s see what you’ve got, _Moooorty_.”

Morty’s eyes were better adjusted for the dimness under the desk so she could appreciate the sight of Rick’s dick without squinting, watching in fascination as it bobbed slightly when she skimmed her hands up the inside of his thighs.

Before Morty had sex – back when she’d only seen dicks in porn or in those weird illustrations in health books – Morty never would have thought she’d appreciate that particular part of the human anatomy. Now, looking at Rick’s flushed, red skin, tracing her fingers gently along his length, she realized knowing what he could do with it – knowing what _she_ could do with it – had really simmered a deep vat of appreciation for the appendage.

She blew a light breath against the head teasingly, watching it bob at the faint stimulation. Morty couldn’t help the smirk that curved up her lips (not that it mattered, Rick couldn’t see her down there anyways – something she intended to use to her advantage). After just long enough of a pause that the muscles in Rick’s thighs jerked under her hands, she leaned up and licked a fat stripe up the thick vein lining the underside of his cock.

Rick groaned and the wood above her head faintly _thunk_ ed, like Rick had dropped his fist onto the desk. “Such a fucking _tease_ ,” he grit between his teeth and Morty smiled, blowing another puff of cool breath along the trail of saliva she’d left on his skin.

She had to wrap her hand around the base to give herself a better angle as she leaned in, her knees already starting to scrape against the rough cement, but she’d done this in much less comfortable positions and on far nastier floors. If anything, the discomfort grounded her, kept her stable, insistently reminded her that _this was real_ when a surprisingly large part of her brain was still convinced it was just another weirdly realistic dream she was watching from somewhere outside her body.

The loud exhale Rick loosed when she licked her lips - her tongue just _barely_ making contact with his head - and the way he shifted in his seat, spreading his legs until his knees knocked the drawers on either side of her, made Morty wonder if _he_ had missed this as much as she had.

She dragged her lips across his leaking tip, savoring the salty, musky, _familiar_ taste of Rick, breathing in the smell of him – something that had firmly lodged itself into her brain associated with pleasure. She was already _painfully_ turned on but she could wait for later when Rick inevitably returned the favor. He always did after all. _With gusto_.

Her tongue was light and teasing when it slid past her lips to lick, circling the tip and wrapping around him when she leaned up and sucked the head into her mouth. A heavy sigh and the scratch of fingernails on wood told Morty Rick wasn’t unmoved by the treatment and she hollowed her cheeks as she swallowed more of his length.

Morty would have never guessed how much she could enjoy giving head. There was something amazing about being on her knees in front of the smartest man in the universe and reducing him to Jell-O, the usual, intimidating persona falling away until he trembled beneath her ministrations, sweet talking her, urging her on, whispering things that otherwise he’d _never_ cop to.

“ _God,_ you’re a fucking treasure, Morty,” he murmured, proving her thought process right, the words muffled like they were being spoken through his hand. “Your mouth, _your lips_ , jeezus you figured this out quick. _Shit_.”

Morty squirmed at the praise, lengthening her neck and taking him in deep, relished the chocked off gasp Rick swallowed down when he nudged against the back of her throat. “You’ve been hungry for it too, haven’t you? Bet you’ve been thinking about it, _fantasizing_ about fucking me with your mouth.” She had been and had long ago passed the point of being embarrassed by that fact, humming her agreement against his glans. Rick’s chuckled was interrupted by his own low moan.

“You’re perfect, Morty.” His thumbs appeared under the table, his fists gripping the edge of the desk like a lifeline “You’re a real – you’re my little cock-hungry slut, that’s what you are, Morty. Grandpa’s little _pervert_.”

Morty was just starting to wonder if the collar would still shock her for touching herself outside of the bunker when Rick’s posture drastically changed, his spine straightening while the litany of pleasure sounds and panting abruptly cut off. Morty pulled back, about to release him with a sucking pop but Rick’s hand was at the back of her neck, holding her in place.

“Mmmr -” she tried to express her confusion but Rick shushed her, rocking gently into her mouth, his head swiping along her tongue.

“Your mom just pulled up, Morty,” he whispered urgently and Morty’s whole body jolted. She might have banged her head against the top of the desk if Rick hadn’t curled his fingers into her hair and held her in place, his grip borderline-painful.

Morty hadn’t seen her mother in – _oh jeez_ , fucking forever – but she’d _never_ imagined the first time she’d lay eyes on her again would be with Rick’s dick in her mouth, still faintly thrusting like he was _getting off_ on Morty’s horror and mortification. Which was probably _exactly_ what was going on.

She tried prying away from him, bracing her hands on his hips and shoving as best she could but he’d planted his legs and he was as unmovable as a mountain. “Do you want her to see you, Morty?” he hissed, chiding her and clenching her hair tighter when she tried to push him forward. “She’s getting the groceries out of the trunk but she’d notice if you climbed out from under my desk. She’s not an _idiot_.”

Anxious tears gathered at the corner of Morty’s eyes and Rick finally, _finally_ released her hair. She backed as far into the shadowed alcove as she could, trapped by the nest of wires and the wall behind her. Rick’s knees blocked her in on either side, his cock (spit-shiny with her saliva) bobbing once for attention. The space was too small though and her breath still teased his flushed skin.

For one wild, unimaginable moment, Morty wondered what would happen if she called out to her mom. She didn’t want to go back to the bunker – wasn’t that why she was crouched under Rick’s desk in the first place? - and if she called out to mom, if her mother saw her teary eyed and crammed under Rick’s desk, chin slick with spit… would mom take her side…?

“Go ahead and get her attention, Morty,” Rick hummed, low and dark and dangerous, the statement spit out between his teeth. Morty froze. He _could_ read her mind. “Do you want her to know you got down on your knees and _begged_ to suck my cock? How do you think she’ll respond to that?”

Morty’s blood froze to liquid nitrogen and a horrible spike of something close to shame but so much more velvety made her thigh clench.

“You could do it right now, you know, I won’t stop you. Just clamor on out, Morty, and we can see how she reacts.”

“Hey!” a voice called in greeting from the driveway, _mom’s_ voice, a little breathless but cheery.

“Hey sweetie,” Rick answered, and in the spaces underneath Rick’s leg and between the chair and the desk, Morty watched her mother’s feet pace into the garage and stop by the door to the house. “Good day?”

“ _Great_ day, Dad,” mom answered and something awful clenched at Morty’s heart. When was the last time mom had a ‘great’ day? Morty had gone nearly fifteen years assuming her mother was incapable of real, _actual_ happiness. Then Rick moved in. “I’ve been thinking about those alien med schools –”

“Well?” Rick hummed somewhere between distraction and polite interest. There was a faint sizzle and the smell of melting solder re-permeated the air. “You finally settle on one?”

Mom’s feet shifted and Morty held her breath. Could she see her? Did she know? Would she even _care_ if she did?

The sun was setting and the sliver of the garage Morty glimpsed from her hide-out was painted with long shadows. The twisted shape of one of Rick’s inventions sketched a crooked line across the floor, splitting into two hooked points that caught up mom’s feet like a claw.

“They’re just…” mom sighed and Morty was hardly listening, the pounding blood in her ears too deafening, “Aren’t they all a little too far from home? It’d be a commute,” she wearily settled on. Morty (for what felt like the hundred-millionth time) asked herself what she had done in her past life to wind up in the warped situation she was currently stuck in. Whatever it was, it must have been something _real_ fucked up.

Mom’s feet padded a little closer and there was the light _thump_ of the groceries being set down on the washing machine. Then mom was bending over, a sheet of platinum blond hair falling into view and Morty nearly threw up her own heart.

Was she looking under the table? Had she _seen_ her? _Jeezus, please no._

But mom’s face never ducked below the ledge of the table; there was no flash of wide accusatory hazel eyes or thin lips twisted into a glower. Mom had only bent over to grab the stool Morty had knocked over earlier, her shock of bright hair disappearing as she straightened to set it back upright on its legs.

“Ye- _euuuugh-_ eah,” Rick acknowledged with a scoff but Morty could barely hear him over the sound of her own breathing, loud and fierce and fast in the cramped space. She hoped to _god_ she was the only one who could hear sharp sounds of her inhales but she couldn’t reign them in to save her life. “They’re the best in the _universe_ Beth, and let’s just say the Milky Way isn’t known for its intellectual contributions or an appreciation for the finer points of science.” He shifted slightly and Morty was distracted momentarily by the sight of Rick’s penis, the flushed head bobbing just inches from her face. “You’d probably be one of the first from this galaxy to actually accomplish anything besides me and you’d _definitely_ be the first human from earth to practice medicine up to galactic standard.”

Morty could practically feel her mother straightening with pride and something a little cocky that must have been genetic. Morty didn’t really understand what they were talking about – she was still thrown off balance just from hearing a voice besides her own and Rick’s – but her stomach wrapped itself up in knots anyways.

A distraction – that’s what she’d been looking for – something to keep her mind off how overwhelming and overstimulating her first trip outside the bunker felt. If she hadn’t been such a fucking _slut_ and launched herself at Rick the first chance she got, she might not be in this mess. As it was, even with her eyes squeezed closed tight, she still couldn’t turn off the spiral of shame that _should_ have been crippling but instead simmered like something toxic.

Rick was always her crutch for that. She leaned into his hard embrace; letting him wrap her up and dress her down and tug her in every possible direction. And now she was so broken that the embarrassment of her situation was pooling to her stomach in a hot, recognizable, _inappropriate_ rush.

“Right,” mom asserted, and the clarity of her voice, the sudden reminder that Rick and Morty _didn’t_ exist in a void, that she was doing something awful, that she _was_ something awful, narrowed Morty’s world down to Rick’s still prominent, unflagged erection. “But it took _hours_ to get there. I can’t waste that kind of time commuting. If I had a portal gun –”

“No can do, sweetie,” Rick’s voice hummed above Morty – deep and authoritative and comforting. Morty very carefully braced herself with a hand on the cement when she leaned forward, grateful for the long drape of Rick’s lab coat to cast her in shadow. “Too many id- _eeough_ -iots after the tech to have one out of my sight.” He paused like he was thinking something over and his swollen erection gave a mighty pulse. “I could always automate a ship – it’d be like riding the train or the bus or some shit but more private and, you know, with a lot less urine.”

“Hmm…”

“Or well, exactly however much urine you want, you live your life.”

Mom’s feet shifted but that was peripheral in Morty’s lusty haze, her focus entirely wrapped around the place Rick’s long legs met and the hot skin begging for attention. She shouldn’t do it. If she did it, she really _was_ a cock-hungry slut. Not to mention so many things _so much worse_ , but now that the idea was in her head, she couldn’t quite push it out. And with so few real ways of retaliating against Rick, it seemed like a decent option for revenge, even if it was small and petty and would likely be playing directly into his hand.

“I guess we could set you up with an apartment off-world,” Rick said with the kind of feigned casualness that Morty saw right through. But she didn’t much care about what Rick was talking about with mom or why he’d be playing an act. All she cared about was the way his leg jerked when she leaned forward and faintly traced the length of his dick with her tongue.

Rick cleared his throat, the noise innocuous to anyone but Morty who _knew_ it was disguising a groan, and continued on. “I know some good places – they’d cut your commute down to _minutes_.”

“Yeah – but… I don’t know Dad, could I really leave the kids?”

Morty suckled at his tip, relishing the trembling of his legs when she ducked her head down, taking him deeper.

“Summer’s practically out the door,” Rick said, and Morty was impressed with how calm and level his voice was. If their position were reversed Morty would _never_ have managed to keep her cool. “Morty’s got another year or so but I’m around so it’s not like she’d be _alone_.” Morty twirled her tongue over the head on the back stroke and wrapped her hand around the base of his cock where her lips couldn’t quite reach to tug in time with her gently bobbing head. “ _I can manage Morty just fine_ ,” he said, his voice liquid mercury, and Morty shivered and suppressed a moan.

In the silence that followed, Morty was extra careful to be quiet, even as she ducked her head, the length of him threatening to prod her throat and make her gag. Morty was _electric_ with fear, with arousal, with shame and self-disgust. She was awful. She was so _so_ awful and something about knowing that was setting her blood on fire.

“Think about it,” Rick grumbled, and if Morty didn’t know better, she might not think anything of his slightly raspier voice or the way it had dropped down an octave from normal – except she _did_ know better, she knew it was _her_ driving him crazy and forcing him to keep calm and the power trip was making her dizzy.

Mom recognized a Rick-dismissal when she heard one and Morty was relieved when she heard the door to the kitchen creak open. “Dinner in thirty.”

The latch had barely caught before Rick pulled back, his chair wheeling away and his dick slipping out of Morty’s mouth with a comical pop. She wasn’t sure what she looked like; on hands and knees ducked below his desk, her mouth and chin sloppy-slick with spit and precum, Rick’s collar still an unignorable weight around her neck.

But Rick looked _manic_ , like he’d just snorted a line of glistening blue powder or set off a bomb and was happily watching a planet implode.

For one moment – one terrifyingly crystal clear moment – Morty saw what they were: two depraved people who never _ever_ should have met. Because becoming this, becoming _his_ , was inevitable. There was no version of this where she didn’t cling to his coat tails as he tripped through worlds, didn’t debase herself to watch those eyes spark, didn’t twist his scraps of affection into something close enough to love that she could never turn it away.

Rick trailed calloused fingers over her cheekbone and twined them into her hair, leveraging her head back and absolutely _devouring_ her with his eyes.

Morty – despite every ounce of logic in her body screaming that she should – couldn’t bring herself to harbor a single regret.

“You sick little –” his voice rasped, choked and strained when only a moment ago he’d sounded so composed. “You can’t hide from me, Morty. I’m on to your games.” He hauled her towards him with the grip in her hair, her mouth opening automatically to accept the cock he angled into her mouth. “You _like_ playing the victim, you like pretending you’re innocent in all this” – he built up a steady pace, thrusting into her mouth, pushing her _just_ far enough to bring tears to the corners of her eyes but never far enough to gag – “but you _love_ the things I do to you, don’t you Morty?”

Her fingers dug into his hips as she hummed her agreement. She wanted more of him, was desperate for every inch of him, she wanted to punish herself with his body and drown in the sounds of his pleasure. She was _blind_ with arousal, could hardly think for how needy she was, for how much she wanted him to pull out of her mouth, bend her over, and fuck her to death – if that’s what it took.

Rick’s eyes were glued to her. She caught his staring when she glanced up through her wet eyelashes, held in place by wild blue eyes.

“You _want_ me to lock you up, to keep you, to shape the world until there’s nothing between us,” he said low and sweet and dangerous and Morty was sure that thought had never been in her head before but now it was there, horrible and toxic and true. She could already feel it simmering her insides, like acid corroding a hole all the way through her.

“ _God_ you’re such a – in front of your own mother, Morty? Fuck, I knew you were special.” Her eyes cut to the door as she belatedly realized mom was still _right there_ – just on the other side of a thin wooden door, cooking dinner for Rick and Summer and blissfully unware of the things happening under her roof.

Rick, those snake eyes too-smart and all knowing, grinned liked something feral and read her mind. “Do you _want_ people to see?” His somewhat crazy sounding laugh cut off when she did her best to hollow her cheeks and suck, his cackling dissolving into a smothered, drawn out moan. “You _want_ people to know you belong to me.” It was almost a question and he bore into her eyes with a look like a drill bit. “ _Shit you - you’re_ _fucking perfect, Morty_ ,” he stammered out, and Morty knew he was close from the way his entire body tightened, his hips tensing, his torso bending to bow over her. “ _Oh fuck – I’m – Morty I’m–_ ”

Thick ropes of cum spurted onto the back tongue of coated her throat but she was well versed in the practice so she didn’t choke or cough or wince like she might have the first couple of times. Instead she reflexively swallowed, doing her best to put the taste out of her mind and replace it with satisfaction that _she_ – of all the people in the fucking multiverse – was the one to get Rick Sanchez off.

That possessive knot behind her heart was soothed with his blissed out look of reverence softening Rick’s features as he eased her off his spent dick and thumbed off the spittle and cum on her chin. Then his palms were brushing the hair away from her face as something almost like _wonder_ turned his face rapturous, live-wire eyes darting across her features.

“Do you think –” she rasped and cleared her throat self-consciously while he blinked patiently down at her. “Can I sleep in your bed tonight, Rick? With – with you?” Rick let out a little huff of breath somewhere between a scoff and a laugh, a strange smile – a _real_ smile – turning up the corners of his mouth before he covered it with the flask he pulled from his pocket and sipped from. Then he hauled her to her feet (jeez, her knees ached) and tugged her onto his lap, her legs on either side of his waist.

“Morty –” he cut himself off again with another rolling chuckle that she felt in her chest where it pressed against his. He nudged her face with his, kissing her temple and nosing at her hair line, his arms wrapped around her back. “Buddy, after that stunt? You’re sleeping with me _every_ night.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there's always time for a good old-fashioned bj


	8. Chapter Eight

Morty half-worried that Rick had agreed to let her sleep with him in some post-orgasmic haze and that he would change his mind once he managed to keep the slightly dopey grin from crinkling the corners of his eyes but she had stressed out over nothing. After a few minutes with his arms wrapped around her waist while his breathing slowed down, he shot a portal and stood up, carrying her through the swirl of green with an arm under her butt like she was a little kid. Then she was plunked unapologetically onto a bed.

The location change triggered another wave of anxiety but at least Rick’s room was cramped and smelled like him and the blinds were closed so a variety of his inventions blinked through the dark in a way not too dissimilar from what he kept in the bunker. His tiny room still seemed too big - even packed as it was with the newer full-size bed and his old desk and nightstand and a shelf covered in gadgets - but for the first time, Morty appreciated the lack of floor space when her heart started to _thunk_ erratically.

Plus his bed (the plush give of a soft mattress below her, the cozy clutch of sheets) and the sight of pillows almost made her cry.

Morty couldn’t image how Rick had put up with that awful camp bed for a year and a half, though admittedly he didn’t seem to sleep so much as he drank himself to unconsciousness. And even back then he had a _pillow._ But after a month (or whatever, _don’t think about it_ ) with nothing but that hard stretch of canvas between rails, Morty sank into the soft alien mattress like it was a marshmallow.

She must have groaned or otherwise expressed that thought aloud because Rick rumbled out a laugh, slumping onto the bed besides her with his strange cat-like grace and she crowded his space immediately. It was warm in his room, _comfortable_ and it surprised her to realize tears (probably of happiness?) were slipping down her cheek unchecked.

Rick brushed them away with something like pride burning hotly in the backs of his eyes.

“Okay, you talked me into upgrading you to this room but don’t think this means you get free reign of the house, Morty,” he said lightly, turning over to dig around in his bedside table drawer. The sight of his back turned and his arm stretched out while she lounged next to him on the bed set off an ingrained response and Morty felt a sliver of hot anticipation slick down to her already molten core. He kept a lot of interesting things in the drawer of his nightstand. _A lot_ of interesting things.

When he slammed the drawer closed, Morty heard the familiar _clink_ of a chain as he turned to his headboard and started fiddling with something front and center.

Despite its relatively unremarkable appearance (square, a little tall, and some non-descript black material that looked like wood but felt like metal) Morty knew the headboard was capable of quite a lot. The whole _bed_ was actually, since it was of alien make and apparently multi-functioning furniture was a _thing_ on Thamulon. Regularly, Rick seamlessly attached and unattached all sorts of things: restraints, vibrators, metal claw hands that knew acupuncture and Swedish massage and intricate surgeries, as well as a terrifyingly long list of things Morty couldn’t imagine ever needing and hoped to never experience first-hand.

So it wasn’t exactly surprising to her when Rick jerked his head at her, beckoning her towards the headboard, and she caught sight of a chain in his hands. He seemed to consider her silently for a moment and Morty knew from the slick between her legs that she was probably less-than-successful at hiding the arousal that spiked in her at his appraising look.

“Come here, Morty,” he murmured, that knowing quirk to his lips telling her he was onto her already, and his palms caught up her waist, tugging her closer to him. He made quick work of untucking her shirt and pulled it over her head. “You won’t be needing that,” he vowed and tossed the offending article onto the floor where it rattled a handful of empty beer cans.

He brought the loose end of the chain - the one not already connected to the center of the headboard by an intimidatingly thick looking mount - to her collar and she had half a moment of thinking ‘ _how is he going to connect that to the smooth collar?_ ’ before he pulled out a tool from his pocket and knocked her chin up lightly with a finger.

Less than a minute later, he pulled back, a cocky smirk crinkling the skin around his eyes more than the corners of his mouth.

“A- _auuuuugh_ -nd you’re all set.”

Morty followed the chain with her fingers to where it now connected at the center of her throat. She gave it a perfunctory tug, the new connection holding solid while Rick’s eyes dilated to massive black holes. She had less than two feet of give from the headboard. Enough to sit up or lay down with her head on a pillow but not much more.

This sort of entrapment was much more familiar than the bunker cell – much more familiar and _much_ more welcome. Morty licked her lips and Rick traced the movement with his eyes like he was a starving man and her mouth was a hot meal.

“That picture you sent Morty,” he whispered in the dark, his voice rough-cut rocks and gravel. “Fuck, do you have any idea what you did to me with that?” His hands were at her waist again, unzipping her skirt and yanking it down with her underwear. “I never thought you’d have it in you, you fucking tease. You _surprised_ me, Morty.” He said it like he hadn’t thought her capable of it. “And that collar – _fuck_ – I like the look you wearing my collar…”

He trailed off, yanking her towards his mouth with his hand around the chain and Morty let herself be pulled willingly.

His tongue tangled with hers immediately, plunging into her mouth with a vengeance as she did her best to crawl into his lap, straddling his hips and pressing herself to his groin. He chuckled against her lips and pulled back, sliding off the edge of the bed and watching with manic eyes as she strained against the chain to follow him.

“I’ll be back in a little bit, Morty,” he chided with a smirk and Morty nearly snarled. “You stay here and think about how _generous_ I can be if you’re good.” He backed up to the door, his almost flushed face giving him away, telling Morty he didn’t _want_ to turn his back on her, except that he knew the torture of his absence would make her _wild_. He blindly tilted up a fist and knocked the button for the sound barrier and the familiar, reddish pulse traveled down the walls and circled her in a cocoon, the sounds of footsteps upstairs and dishes clattering in the kitchen fading away to silence.

“I can be good, Rick,” Morty swore, her voice embarrassingly needy and high-strung, a fist wrapped around the chain at her throat. Rick groaned at the sight and dragged a hand over his face, his eyes liquid fire.

“I know, buddy. I know.” And then he opened the door and backed out of it, shutting it quickly and leaving her to her new soundproof prison.

With a childish, aggravated shout, Morty threw herself down onto the mattress and buried her face in a pillow. Why was he being such a fucking _tease_? She was so wound up she thought she might explode out of her skin but Rick was content to keep making her _wait_. She thought briefly about touching herself (shocks or no, she was _sure_ she could hit an orgasm before the pain got too intense) but decided that probably didn’t qualify as ‘ _being good_ ’ so she fisted her hands and rubbed them into her eyes hard enough to see colors spark in the dark behind her closed lids.

After ( _oh jeez_ ) more than a month ( _stop thinking about that_ ) she was depressingly well versed in de-escalating her own arousal and after a few minutes of careful breathing she had calmed down enough to think a little more reasonably. Unfortunately, without the distracting fog of lust, her anxiety vied for attention, pooling back into all the available crannies of her brain as she pulled the tangled comforter up over her naked body to shield her from the sudden feeling of exposure.

Rick’s room _wasn’t_ as overwhelming as the garage. It smelled like him; not the noxious chemical smell his lab coat sometimes picked up or the ozone tang of the garage but the smell of _him_ – of his skin and his soap and his sweat. She focused intently on that familiar scent and let it soothe her frayed edges. It was comfortably dim with the blinds closed but the light cutting through the cracks was blood red with sunset and oddly unreal looking to Morty who had grown so used to cool fluorescent lighting and dark shadows.

While her heart started to race uncomfortably in her chest, she reminded herself that she had spent _hundreds_ of hours in this bed, in this room, watching those slats of sunlight move across the wall or paint shapes across Rick’s naked skin. There wasn’t any reason to feel _anxious._ She should be _comfortable_ – with a pillow under her head and a soft mattress at her back and the comforting weight of his quilt keeping her from floating away. Not to mention the collar at her neck and the chain tethering her to the headboard – _those were important_ – those meant this was where _Rick_ wanted her and she could manage _anything_ if it was for Rick.

The digital clock on his bedside table told her it was 7:52pm. She stared at the numbers long enough that when she refocused, the clock read _7:57_. Time felt _unreal_. It seemed like it should be so much earlier than that to Morty, who had been awake for barely a few hours by the time Rick showed up in the bunker.

Looking too long at the green numbers was disorienting so Morty closed her eyes and pointedly turned away, feeling overwhelmed.

Down in the bunker, she had fought off the frequent spikes of anxiety by imaging Rick and what he might be doing. Before she’d been making wild guesses, cobbling together weird fantasies. They tended to swing between Rick getting wrapped up in situations that would have been easily solved by her assistance while he desperately lamented her absence and the much more upsetting thought of Rick discovering unexpectedly that he was much better off without her. Whichever fantasy her brain chose to supply didn’t feel entirely under her control.

But now – with a clock blaring the time at her and the evening sunlight and mom’s parting words - Morty realized belatedly that Rick was probably sitting down to eat dinner with mom and Summer, an activity so commonplace it took almost no effort to imagine.

Except today… in a room no more than thirty feet away and separated from her by one single plywood door, Morty’s chair was empty.

By now, her absence could no longer be noteworthy. They must have bought into _whatever_ excuse Rick burped out ages ago or else… because how could mom go about her life so casually – picking up groceries and cooking dinner and looking at alien schools with Rick – if she was wondering where her youngest daughter was?

Meanwhile, instead of sitting at the table and eating whatever vague attempts at cooking mom had thrown together, Morty was curled up in Rick’s bed, chained to it like a dog waiting for its owner to leave a shop.

Morty rolled over, straining against the short tether just to feel the pull of it against her throat, the feeling oddly centering when her consciousness tried hard to slip away into a dissociative fugue. The weight, the sensation of metal on skin and the slight tug at her windpipe washed away the low level anxiety still prickling up her spine and stirred the brewing pot of heat low in her stomach that hadn’t entirely stopped simmering since the activities in the garage. She clung to that shift in mood, desperate to shut off the thoughts that whispered cruel things ( _you’re nothing, nobody cares about you, everyone’s happier without you_ ) with the memory of Rick’s eyes searing over her head to toe like he wanted to take her apart to see how she worked.

Rick wanted her… physically at least… if not in all the ways she wanted.

And it wasn’t like Morty was completely opposed to being objectified even though she knew she wasn’t supposed to think like that – that those thoughts were toxic and, if ever spoken aloud, would almost certainly land her in therapy.

But sometimes being an _object_ was easier than being a _person_.

Objects didn’t need to feel good or bad about themselves. They didn’t suffer absurd bouts of anxiety attacks for being in their own home, and an object had no qualms about where it was placed or how it was kept. It simply existed.

Sometimes, just _existing_ was about the most Morty could manage.

So she turned off the parts of her that knew how fucked up everything was - that knew how fucked up _she_ was and how much she’d never _ever_ have a chance to be normal. She carefully shuffled those thoughts to the back of her brain and instead inhaled the heady scent of Rick’s shampoo still lingering in his pillow. She kicked a leg out of the covers and coiled the folded fabric between her legs, grinding against it in a slow roll. It felt okay – the stimulation not nearly direct enough and her brain too preoccupied with self-hatred, but by the time she’d established a rhythm she had manage to lose herself in sensation. With effort, she focused her thoughts and traced her lips with her fingers while remembering what it had been like to smear Rick’s precum along the plush, sensitive skin while she wreathed in lustful agony.

That was how Rick found her, not too much later. With the sound barrier, there was no warning pad of footsteps to interrupt her desperate squirming and the door swung open unexpectedly, a patch of light from the downstairs hall making Morty squint. Backlit, it was hard to make out Rick’s features or what he thought of her humping his covers like a deranged animal but she knew him well enough to know he liked the sight of her debasing herself. Her cheeks flushed but all she could see was the metallic glimmer of his right eye, a hot spark in his otherwise dark face, and then he was pulling the door closed behind him and dropping them both back into comfortable darkness.

Rick tore his clothes off like they were on fire, his hands precise and efficient but nowhere near his trademarked casual grace and the sight inspired a guttural groan from Morty’s throat that embarrassed her once she heard it echoed back against the soundproof barrier. Once his chest was bare, he threw himself onto the bed and pried Morty’s legs apart with strong arms, burying his face in her folds while Morty shouted in surprise at the sudden invasion.

Rick ate her out like a starved man eating his first good meal. There was nothing delicate about the way he plunged his tongue inside her, the sharp, hard edge of his teeth pressed against her labia, until he backed off enough to lave over her clit with the full flat of his tongue. It was brutal and imprecise and it was setting off sparks in her brain like a trail of cut wires.

“ _Oh jeez – Rick –_ ” she wailed before she shoved the meat of her palm between her teeth to stifle the awful, bad-porno noises spilling out of her uncontrollably.

She hadn’t expected him to do _that_. It felt like _ages_ since he’d ran that skillful tongue along her slit, long enough that she had forgot how _good_ it could feel. Fuck, a month had been too long – _way_ too long – she was gonna burst like a fucking balloon.

“That’s it baby, you’re fucking _depraved_ for me, aren’t you?” he whispered against her inner thigh before biting hard enough to make her yelp. He sucked her skin into his mouth bruisingly and the sting was only rivaled by the way it keyed up her pleasure, the pull of his mouth distracting her from the finger he circled lightly around her opening, her skin so oversensitive she swore she could feel the shape of his callouses against her wet flesh. “Jeezus Christ I could keep you here forever, Morty,” he promised darkly, his warm breath puffing over the sensitive skin of her cunt and she might have snapped her legs closed on instinct if he wasn’t holding them open with his elbows on her thighs.

He licked and bit and sucked at the skin of her upper legs and lower stomach, taunting her after his first headlong dive into going down on her, his finger never more than a faint pressure at her entrance, teasingly pulling away anytime she squirmed lower. Eventually she had chased him as far as her short tether allowed her, her fingers clawing for his hair, trying to drag him to her core which was _throbbing_ with need, the grumbling chuckles he pressed to her hip a delicious vibration _just shy_ of where she wanted to feel it.

“ _Fuck_ , Rick, _please_ ,” she begged, nearly incoherent, her eyes tearing up so bad the ceiling was nothing but a waterlogged, off-white swirl. “ _Please, please, please_.”

When he crawled up her body, her knees dropped open to make room for him, her legs circling his waist and clinging to him, desperate to keep him against her – suddenly terrified he’d chuckle and pull away and walk out the door. She wasn’t sure when he managed to take off his pants but he was bare – gloriously, _wonderfully_ bare, his skin a fucking _blessing_ against hers – and the hot length of his erection slotted against her folds and threatened to scald her with pleasure.

“You know I could keep you like this, Morty,” he said darkly and it took a great deal of effort but she blinked away the moisture in her eyes and carefully focused in on the dark grin pulling up Rick’s cheeks and shadowing his eyes. He was leaned above her, his arms caging her in, one hand wrapped around the chain attached to her collar and pressing it into the mattress, forcing her to tilt her chin up as the metal tugged at her neck.

He looked wild, unhinged – _rabid_ – and Morty would let him to rip her apart if it meant he’d shift his hips and press into the space between her legs that _ached_ for him. But he held steady and his feverish whispering continued. “I could keep you in here forever, Morty. I could cage you up in the bunker for the rest of your life, or chain you to my headboard and fuck you raw, and no one would ever know, Morty. I could do _anything_ to you.”

A thin trail of fear sluiced through Morty like a pebble through a pond but the accompanying rush of adrenaline and hyper-awareness only sharpened the feel of his skin against hers; the heat of his pulsing cock rocking gently between her folds and the cold touch of his fingers when he trailed his free hand from her throat to her nipples and a wave of goosebumps rose in their wake.

But Rick’s eyes were screaming something else, that strange manic glow that sometimes burned out of him like a laser pointer, and she liked to think – something she let herself _pretend_ – that there were things Rick might never say to her but that didn’t mean those things weren’t _there_.

And it was easier to let herself believe that sort of harmless lie than imagine the alternative.

“I know, Rick,” she murmured back to him quietly, running her hand along the smooth skin of his upper arms just to feel him under her fingertips, to know he was _there_. And god, he _could_ do whatever he wanted to her, not because he seemingly controlled the very fabric of her existence but because she’d _let_ him, because she’d do anything if it meant he might smile at her, just one more time.

The ferocity melted from his face but that fever bright light in his eyes intensified and Morty knew she’d done something right.

“It’s just me and you, Morty,” he whispered, leaning over her, caging her in with his arms to sink his teeth into the plush of her lower lip and pulling, gentle and goading and so damn good.

“Rick and Morty forever,” she conceded, breathing the words into his mouth and he grinned at her as he lined his stiff length up and pressed against her entrance.

It had been a long time since she’d been penetrated (two of his fingers pushed up into her the day she didn’t call out for Summer the last real stretch) and it had stung then but that edge of pain had added to the sudden, shocking invasion of pleasure.

But his dick was much thicker and longer than two fingers and she could feel how tight she’d become in the interim. She half expected the maniac above her to lose patience and slam into her (suddenly Trisha’s words, “ _he just, like, speared me,_ ” rose up in Morty’s memory unbidden) and her face scrunched up as she braced herself for rough treatment.

But he sank into her slowly, just deep enough that he could pull his hand away to hold himself up over her and rock shallow and slow into her channel, opening her up with deliciously teasing strokes, just like he had the first time, letting her adjust and relax around him at her own pace, his attention fixated on her, his rhythm altering at every miniscule muscle twitch that made it to her face.

But that sort of patience, that sort of _care_ after more than a month ( _stop it!_ ) of something else entirely felt like too much and not enough, like her expanding heart might choke her out even as she writhed against the bedsheets. “More, Rick,” she panted, struggling to sink him deeper but his hand on her tether kept her rooted to the mattress.

“Tell me, Morty,” he demanded and even though the statement was ridiculously open ended, she knew what he wanted – what he _always_ wanted – and what she was helpless to give him.

“I love you Rick, _fuck_ , _please_ ,” she breathed and the way his eyes burned in the dark sent shivers down her spine. “I don’t fucking care what you do with me, I’m yours. _Jeez_ just fuck me, _please_.”

“If that’s what you really want, Morty,” he growled above her and she watched sparks explode in the black of his pupils as he finally, thankfully, thrust entirely into her. Their hips slotted together like they were meant to match and for one frantic, tiny eternity, Rick stilled above her and they panted together, their quick breaths coinciding, and Morty fell headlong into the black holes that were his eyes.

“Goddamnit _move_ , Rick,” she bit out and with a rough chuckle he complied, thrusting slow at first and building to a steady pace that lit up her nerve endings like an electrical board.

She was practically babbling, incoherent strings of ‘ _yes_ ’ and ‘ _more_ ’ and ‘ _please_ ’ and ‘ _Rick_ ’ blurring together until Rick started slamming into her in earnest. He grimaced down at her, his usual borderline-sickly pale features flushed a spectacular pink as his patience disappeared, slinging her legs up onto his elbows and tilting her up until his strokes had her eyes rolling into the back of her head.  

“ _Oh fuck_ I missed this,” Rick was growling above her and she popped her eyes open to see he’d closed his, the expression twisting his face somewhere between determined aggravation and reverence. The moan ripped out of Morty’s throat was obscene. “Grandpa – _oh fuck_ \- grandpa missed you, Morty,” he stammered and despite the shiver that wracked her entire frame at his words, her body jumping ten steps closer to orgasm at his rough admission, she was suddenly positive she was about to start crying.

Rick squinted down at her like he knew and his voice was demanding when he breathed, “Tell me how much you missed me, Morty.”

Tears leaked out the corners of her eyes and she scrambled to touch whatever part of him she could, his hips, his shoulders, his chest. She wanted to press her hands to his face but he was too far away and it was going to kill her, this tiny, almost breakable distance.

“I’d – Rick, I’d die without you,” she gushed, her voice thick with something terrifyingly lost between a moan and a sob. “I missed you so bad. I missed the way you feel _inside_ me.” His mouth dropped open as he punctuated her statement with a particularly forceful thrust that set of fireworks behind her eyes. “I’m never leaving you, Rick,” she promised, hating how uneven her voice was and how blurred Rick’s vehement stare was by the tears in her eyes.

“That’s right, Morty,” he groaned and she knew he was getting close from the ragged, torn sounds he entirely gave up on moderating. And Morty, as always, was desperately on his heels. “Tell me again, buddy. Say it again.”

“ _I love you, Rick_ ,” and she was so grateful for him in this moment, so wildly indebted to him for his attention and his mercy and that light in the back of his eyes that was just for her, that she had never in her life meant those words more. His thumb found her clit as reward and Morty arched her back like the bed was on fire.

It was his face that pushed her over the edge, that vulnerable, unmasked, almost _shocked_ expression that came with every one of his orgasms and never ceased to amaze and titillate her. It felt like she was witness to something secret (though, objectively, she well knew Rick’s O-face was hardly secret to the universe). It was one of the few expressions she knew without a doubt was hiding nothing.

And when he slanted his eyes open blearily with one last thrust, she was finally thrown over the edge of her orgasm, that warm pool of something _almost_ like affection warming his gaze sending her careening into the white-out abyss.

Her mind completely fuzzed out in the way only truly spectacular orgasms could induce. Her body was pure sensation while everything else – all her worries and her hang ups and all the crippling doubts - were left behind.

Slowly, in disappointing shades of grey, she came back to herself even as she wished the feeling could last forever.

Rick was curled up beside her, still panting (good she hadn’t been fuzzed out for too long) but glowering at her with his most neutral scowl. He raised a finger to her face and what she thought was meant to be a gentle caress turned out to be Rick wiping away a trail of tears she hadn’t realized she was still leaking.

He looked… well not exactly _concerned_... nothing that strong, but there was faint edge of uncomfortability hanging around the downturned corners of his mouth and she desperately didn’t want him unhappy so she swallowed the weight that had settled in her throat and croaked out a raspy laugh.

“Shit, Rick, I - I came so hard I _still_ can’t feel my toes,” she wiggled the appendages in question and the barely-there tension slid off Rick’s face like water.

“I’m just that good, Morty,” he grinned, tangling his legs around hers and sneaking his arm in under her neck. Rick had a way of wrapping his lanky body around her, cocooning her against his skin until she felt completely shielded from the outside world, her ear pressed against his chest, steadying herself against the constant, rhythmic pumping that almost always beat at the exact same pace. You could wind a clock to his heartbeats, something Morty envied horribly.

With Rick twined around her, she almost felt like she could disappear inside of him, become a part of him like another arm or leg – something useful and vital that he’d be hard pressed to remove. She wasn’t so disillusioned to think that any of those thoughts were normal, healthy, or _sane_ , but she had long since abandoned the idea that she was going to be a normal, healthy, sane person.

He watched with calm, half-mast eyes as she held up his hand by the wrist and pressed their palms together, comparing size. His hand was much bigger, his fingers longer and more shapely even though they were lined with callouses. His bones and tendons and veins stood out much more prominently on the back of his hand than hers did and the skin was looser with age, greying and marked by a lifetime of small knicks and chemical burns. His knuckles were knobby with skin grown and regrown, the scars of fist fights long forgotten.

She hadn’t thought it possible to love Rick anymore but somehow his placid, bordering on faintly amused expression that unlined his face as she pressed their palms against each other and he quirked his fingertips to emphasize their difference in size _gutted_ her. She loved him so much it _hurt_ , a constant ache that weighed her down like gravity, and she swallowed heavily against the returning sting behind her eyes.

She needed to say something, she needed to distract herself, she needed to get Rick talking so that she wouldn’t start sobbing and cling to him like a total lunatic. “What was it like – your first time?” she asked, breaking the companionable silence and startling herself by putting the thought she hadn’t realized she’d been brewing on for ages into words.

“My first time _what_ , Morty?” Rick hummed against her temple, his voice soft and soothing and level and Morty breathed out a relieved sigh.

“You know – _your first time_. When you lost your – I mean the first time you had – uh – _sex_.” She had no idea why she was suddenly so shy to say the word, especially after what they’d just done, what they were likely to do again in the very near future, and what she very much hoped they’d _keep_ doing until the day she (probably prematurely) died. They were still lying completely naked, wound around each other like a knot, and she was fairly sure they’d undressed the mattress with their vigorous activities. Not to mention she was still collared and tethered to his fucking bed – how was she still blushing over the word ‘ _sex_ ’?

She could feel the tight line his lips pressed against her hairline and she wondered if it was a bad memory to bring up but she felt the brief touch of a kiss to her temple before he started talking. “Not much of a story,” he admitted quietly. “I was drunk. He was drunk. It was quick and, I mean, honestly it was _bad sex_ , Morty, real – real skill-less sexual etiquette, this guy – like a two on a scale to ten (and I’m being generous cause I have met some _real_ bad lays). But I wasn’t looking for _romance_ or _feelings_ or whatever and I got off so I considered it a success.” Morty absorbed that, tilting her wrist to take in the sight of their hands against each other from a new angle. “What got you thinking about that, _Morty_?” he wondered, the first hints of an edge to his voice.

“Just some stuff, Rick.” He was shooting her a look she could barely see out of the corner of her eye so she shrugged and explained: “A while ago I overheard some girls talking about their first times, you know?” She carefully didn’t mention it was during the field trip, determined to never bring up that fiasco again. “Same kind of stories – well, minus the getting off part. None of them really had a good time.”

Rick shifted slightly to drag his arm out from under her so he could lean up and turn his full attention – the full charge of his electric eyes – to her. “Small wonder, Morty. High school boys aren’t exactly known for their sexual prowess.” His eyes narrowed. “What – you wondering what it would have been like if some – some _football jock_ nailed you under the bleachers after the game or some shit? Is that what you’ve been rubbing one out to all this time?”

“Hah, yeah right,” Morty scoffed easily and Rick would never admit it but she was _positive_ she saw something unclench in the crinkles around his eyes. Her cheeks warmed and looking him in the face was a little disconcerting so she turned her gaze to the ceiling. “Just thinking I was lucky, is all.”

His chuckle was a little strange and Morty couldn’t quite decipher the tone (rueful? self-depricating? _what was it_?) but he settled back down next to her, interlocking his fingers with hers and examining the shape they made together.

“I like being with you Rick,” Morty announced to the ceiling, suddenly oddly sure that whatever Rick’s slightly off laugh had been about related to something like that. Rick was a weird guy. Just cause he never said what the fuck he was thinking didn’t mean she had to return the favor. She wanted him to _know_. She wasn’t about to tell him that half the time she wanted to crawl under his skin and be absorbed; the most ineffectual parasite in existence – no, that would probably be too much even for Rick who was a full-fledged sociopath – but she had been surprised to learn he responded unexpectedly well to those sorts of bald exclamations and made a personal goal to keep them up.

( _if a small part of her hoped that her declarations might encourage his own, that didn’t_ hurt _anybody and it wasn’t like she was holding her breath_ )

This time his chuckle was more robust, his sternum shaking her where it pressed against her shoulder. “You’re a good kid, Morty,” he laughed, his breath ruffling her hair and his hand released hers to wrap around her waist and pull her closer. He rubbed his nose along her temple and exhaled a long, weighted sigh into the skin behind her ear. “Too good.”


	9. Chapter Nine

Morty hardly left Rick’s bed for another three days but the slow drag of time in the bunker was a thing of the past. The hours spent naked with Rick in bed were _never_ boring.

If she thought she was going to perish of pent-up frustration locked down in the bunker, she was starting to think it was more likely she would die of being oversexed in this new stage of her punishment (if you could even call it that anymore) – and honestly, it wouldn’t be a bad way to go.

It was like Rick wanted to make up for every moment he’d kept them apart. Sometimes it almost felt like they were trying to set some kind of record or something. They’d roll off each other panting (he spent an entire afternoon with his mouth sealed to hers in the slowest, most gentle make-out session he’d ever tolerated while his fingers sank inside her and turned her _inside out_ ), he’d spring up and disappear through a portal for half a second (ass- _fucking-_ naked), and then he’d reappear with water bottles and protein bars like they had to hurry to replenish their nutrients so they could dive back in.

In the interims, they would sprawl upside down on the bed and all over each other and talk about useless, funny things; what a room full of mirrors would look like, whether emojis advanced communication or were a step backwards, who was gonna fuck who in the new season of ball-fondlers. It was all the best things she had missed about Rick, his companionship, his rapt attention (they _really_ argued about the emoji thing), his quick barks of laughter and bright eyes and all that skin that should be weird and old but was instead a painfully beautiful stretch of scars and stories.

And the sex - _jeez_ , did she love the sex. She had been going through withdrawal and now she felt like a junkie fiending for her next hit. And Rick was an _accommodating_ supplier.

He kept her tethered to the headboard with her collar (though he had long ago extended the chain to give them space for some more… acrobatic positions) but it was hard to mind when his eyes tracked back to it constantly with a fierce blue fire that threatened to light Morty up like a match. If he spent too much time looking at it - as he _frequently_ seemed to be almost hypnotized by the sight of it - she came to sense the exact moment he’d pounce and their practically tantric fucking-around would start all over again.

She silently thanked Rick for the cocktail of drugs he shot into her monthly. Besides a wide range of galactic vaccines and birth control, it likely spared her the inevitable UTI she’d have caught from such constant genital pleasure/abuse.

During the three days in Rick’s room, she also got her first glimpse at another part of the house: the bathroom.

The first time leaving the room on her own and venturing into the bathroom had been… less than pleasant. The lights were too bright and the familiar space made Morty feel confused – like she was walking around a dream version of her house – familiar but foreign; the same but utterly _wrong_.

And the mirror. Yeesh. It had been a _while_ since she’d gotten a look in one of those and she’d never really liked the look of herself before but after so long in the bunker…

She’d lost weight. _Muscle_ weight. Her arms used to be fairly toned – exactly as toned as you’d expect someone who routinely has to scramble over fences or hold heavy riffles or carry priceless intergalactic artifacts while she ran like the devil. Now they were thin and unimpressive and Morty suddenly very much worried that she’d fallen back to start as far as her sidekick skills went.

And she was pale. Really pale. _Sick_ pale. But then again, she could barely open her eyes with the bright lights over the sink blaring their full power so Morty shrugged and told herself she was getting washed out by the unflattering light. Yeah. That was a thing.

Strangest of all, there was something weird about seeing her own face after so long – like she’d half-forgotten she _had_ one. She scowled at the thought and the face in the mirror scowled too. The naked girl Morty observed in front of her _suited_ the band of blinking metal wrapped around her throat - _much_ more than she suited the thin gold chain and pendant filled with stars resting against her sternum and even more so the fine topaz jewel at her wrist. She looked half wild, half broken, and entirely owned, dark marks from hickeys and bites littering the skin of her shoulders and breasts, bruises at her hips in the obvious shapes of handprints, lips and cheeks flushed with blood.

Briefly Morty wished her brain could tell the difference between horror and arousal but those signals were so tangled up that the brown eyes that met hers in the mirror burned like hot tar.

Morty turned away, pointedly looking down at her hands while she washed a dried up smear of Rick’s semen off the back of her arm. Those thoughts were _dumb_. What did any of that crap matter when on a day-to-day basis, Morty just had to keep dealing with whatever was thrown at her the best she could. Thinking about shit like that wasn’t going to do her any favors.

By the time she walked back through the portal and straight into Rick’s outstretched arm, she’d shuffled all that to the back of her brain, determined not to think about it anymore. Rick snapped the chain around the loop at the front of her throat and latched his mouth onto the sensitive spot where her shoulder met her neck, sucking another mark into her skin and everything else was (momentarily) forgotten.

After that, a couple times a day (whenever she asked, really), Rick would unlock her from the headboard and shoot a portal to the upstairs bathroom, leaving it open so she could jump back through when she was done with whatever needed doing.

That first step out of Rick’s room and into the bathroom was always the worst. What if someone saw her before she closed the door? She made a point to be quick about it – but every time the sight of the stairs leading down into the foyer made her heart pound.

Once she even heard Summer’s voice, singing along to loud music in her bedroom. Morty had been extra quick that time, forgoing washing her hands just to dive back into Rick’s bed quicker but she swore she still heard her sister’s voice, long after the portal spiraled closed.

The sun rose and set and rose again behind the closed blinds and it was bizarre to suddenly have so many ways to know what time of day it was. Turned out her internal clock was _way_ off but their rigorous activities weren’t limited by any time table. They’d fuck and then fall asleep; wake up groggy and start fucking again before Morty even really knew where she was.

With the sound barrier on, the outside world didn’t exist. No birds chirped, no phone rang; there was no music except what Rick played on his phone and the only yelling was the sound of their own voices raised in pleasure. He was so _there_ with her, not distracted by adventures or mom or random angry tirades. Rick drank consistently from various bottles he found littered around the room but he never got _wasted_ , and his good mood was remarkably consistent. He kept smiling at her in some private way, like they were both in on the same secret, and it was addicting.

Not like her life had a plethora of great days for comparison but the time in Rick’s room was easily the best couple days of her life. She’d never felt so _close_ to someone before, and that it was _Rick_ , this brilliant, insane, unknowable man… it made her feel like the luckiest person in the entire multiverse.

She never wanted it to end.

Late on the third day, Morty woke up with her body completely draped over Rick’s like she was a skin blanket. She was sore between her legs to a new, vaguely troubling degree but somehow that wasn’t enough of a turn off for her to keep her hands to herself.

Quietly she observed the man sleeping under her. His face tended to look peaceful in sleep, sometimes even comically lax, but just then it was perfect. Thin lips slightly parted (only a little drool leaking from the corner of his mouth), the first hint of noticeable stubble starting to darken his cheeks, his unibrow slightly tented in an uncharacteristically sympathetic way.

Morty didn’t have enough room inside her for the rush of emotions she felt just _looking_ at him; not that it was all good, flowery, love-y bullshit either. Honestly, she _overflowed_ with indecision about Rick; the memory of her incarceration in the bunker too strange a weight, not to mention all the other awful things he’d done – to her or someone else.

Not that she didn’t love him. She absolutely did. But loving him wasn’t easy.

Then again, no one else in her life had ever made love seem _easy_ so maybe that was just the way of it.

She breathed out a long sigh and reminded herself to focus on the positive. Like the mind-shattering orgasm he’d given her right before she passed out on top of him. Or the awkward, almost uncomfortable but mostly erotic sensation of his dick still inside her, softened but still present.

Tentatively, her muscles sore and achy, she clenched around his soft member, just to see how he’d respond. The first time she tensed she didn’t get much more than a little shift of his head but the second elicited a roughhewn groan and she felt the foreign skin inside of her pulse with interest.

He quirked an eye open in what Morty might have called a glare if she didn’t know him better. “Shit, Morty, can’t you let an old man sleep?” he rumbled, his voice even deeper and raspier from just waking up. The sound of it made her shiver and she blinked happily from where her chin was propped up on his sternum.

“Go on – go back to sleep then, Rick,” she answered, a smirk tugging the corners of her lips as she tightened her muscles and ever so slightly rolled her hips against his. The hiss he spit out between his teeth sounded much less tired.

“You’d fucking like that, pervert,” he growled back, his cool hands sliding down her sides, fingertips tracing gently down her back until he grabbed onto her hips and anchored her to him as he ground up into her. It was her turn to hiss, the sensation too mixed between pain and pleasure.

Rick stilled his movements while his other eye opened to squint at her with the first, both darting around between her features: her eyes, her lips, the furrow of her forehead. He carefully pulled out of her, soothing her hair with gentle strokes and ignoring her faint, half-protest.

“As much as I appreciate the impressive film of sex and sweat we’re covered in, Morty, I think we both could use a shower.” Morty scowled at him briefly, not entirely pleased with his reluctance to have sex. She was _horny_ again (fucking constantly) and just cause it hurt _a little_ didn’t mean she didn’t want it. Rick seemed to read her mind because his lips curved up into a slow smile and he huffed a little laugh, dropping a kiss onto her forehead before rolling her off him. “Come on, bud.”

He unclipped the chain from her collar and had to dig around under the bed for the portal gun (kicked there accidentally while he’d been holding her upside-down in a handstand) before he manhandled her through a swirl of green into the bathroom.

Her heartrate spiked, the bathroom door open to the upstairs hall and the long intimidating stretch of stairs to the foyer and that sliver of the front door that had a perfect view of her and Rick, both of them completely naked and all over each other _in full daylight_.

Rick, completely nonplussed, stretched out a long arm and swung the door closed leisurely. He was practically leering at her when she hurriedly flipped the lock over, boxing her in with his arms just to make her frustrated.

The bathroom wasn’t soundproofed and after three days of just her and Rick and the (numerous) noises they made, Morty was paranoid of being overheard. She could easily pick up sounds from downstairs. The TV. A murmur of voices. Kids were playing on the street and their choppy gales of laughter were filtering in through the open window.

Then Rick turned on the water and everything else faded away but Morty resolved to keep completely silent lest she alert someone downstairs that more than one person was in the bath. Rick (the goddamn mind-reader) smirked at her - one leg up on the rim of the tub showing to full effect his ridiculous long limbs - and fiddled with the knob while he started humming a vague, unfamiliar tune, something he always did when he showered.

She’d heard him singing in the shower through the walls for what felt like forever; _long_ before they’d started fooling around and, on occasion, taking showers together (though when she accompanied him there was usually a lot less humming and a lot more groaning and filthy words). She always kind of thought it was charming, almost _cute,_ if such a word could _ever_ suit Rick Sanchez. It was endearing to hear him half-sing/half-hum out songs of his own invention with ridiculous lyrics through the thin walls of her bedroom; it was a little reminder that Rick was around, that she had a friend, and that the house was a little brighter with his presence lighting up the place.

She wasn’t sure what her face gave away but from the way Rick’s teasing smile dropped and his song tapered off while something molten hot suffused the blacks of his eyes made Morty think he’d seen that wave of affection that kept on crashing into her today, one blow after another.

She realized she was biting her chapped lip and she quickly unstuck it from between her teeth and mouthed ‘ _I love you_ ’ a little exaggerated to make sure he caught her meaning even if she could feel her cheeks flushing with bewildering embarrassment. She couldn’t quite keep her eyes on his face so they darted between Rick’s prominent clavicles and the bare spot on the counter where Summer usually kept her makeup bag, never settling too long on either place as a strange surge of bashfulness filled her chest with something warm.

But she was rewarded for her candidness when one of those rare, soft, devastating, _see-he-_ does _-have-feelings_ smiles slowly melted the age right off Rick until Morty felt like she might be looking at the man who Rick was before the world and all it’s inevitable bull-crap unloaded on top of him.

He held out his arm and she would have crossed a whole desert of broken glass if that was what stood between the two of them.

Rick bent a little to be closer to her level and cradled her face between his two big palms and Morty wildly thought ‘ _this is the moment, this is it_ ,’ but he huffed out a little laugh through his nose and pressed a kiss to her forehead. When he backed up, that cold wall of indifference that made up most of his personality was back and she didn’t let herself feel disappointed because she really, genuinely didn’t need him to say anything and she briefly reprimanded herself for hoping for anything else. Sure it would be nice… it would tack over a few open pits that had taken up residence in her stomach but she’d long ago learned to live with them.

And Rick… he wasn’t the type to… if he wasn’t comfortable, she didn’t want to push him (a hard voice in the back of her head barked out laughing – he obvious didn’t have the same qualms or afford her the same patience). And if it didn’t come from _him_ , if she coerced or requested or demanded he tell her his feelings, it wouldn’t mean what she _wanted_ it to mean. So it was fine. Everything was fine.

Morty shook herself out of the shade of disappointment when Rick started humming again, and his smile wasn’t all frigid pretend so it was no trouble to grin sincerely back.

He sang softly the whole time he washed her – the very fact that he took the time to wash her down with a tenderness that nearly broke her heart was a certain kind of condolence for the words Morty knew she’d never hear. The lyrics he seemed to be working out off the top of his head were silly and he eventually started listing words that rhymed with ‘scrotum’ in a melodic tune that completely belied the subject matter and she had to stifled her giggles with both hands (he eventually settled on ‘scrotum totem’ and Morty nearly brained herself on the shower wall holding in a snort).

Wrapped up in a towel and feeling unnaturally content, she watched Rick dry his hair (still singing – definitely working out the right tune for “Scrotum Totem”) and then he turned the hair dryer to her and brushed and dried her hair. She couldn’t tell whether she felt like a particularly doted upon pet or like a little kid but his fingers were surprisingly gentle and the attention felt nice so she sat through it with no complaints.

Morty wasn’t sure where he procured it from (he was wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist) but when she caught sight of the little bottle of teal nail polish pinched between his thumb and pointer finger, she felt something inside of her unclench that she never realized had gotten tangled up. She splayed her fingers on the counter obediently and he made quick work of reestablishing his physical claim on her (as if the multitude of hickey’s dotting her chest and shoulders weren’t enough), drying them too with the hairdryer.

She lifted her hands and gazed a little vacantly at her nails. It felt good to have that little indication of his presence back on her hands. It felt _right_. That swell of affection rose over her head and swept her under, pining her below its crushing weight.

Leaning her chin against her arm, she watched Rick shave off his three-days growth of stubble. He seemed unbothered by her silent scrutiny, occasionally cutting her looks that might have even been pleased, preening a little and soaking up the attention.

She was still spacing out and appreciating that she hadn’t lost Rick’s favor forever over a _field trip_ when Rick shoved a pile of clothes in her direction and she stared at them blankly. Yellow and blue wrapped around each other in a crumpled knot. And there was something familiar about them…

_Oh._ They were _her_ clothes. Rick was holding out _her_ clothes, his eyes carefully neutral as he quirked half his unibrow at her in expectation.

Right, people wear clothes. Jeez, how wild.

She pulled them on – a pair of jean shorts and a yellow t-shirt. The fabric was wrinkled from where they’d been stashed in the hamper and Morty was briefly confused how they’d gotten there but confusion wasn’t anything new to her and she purposely disregarded it. He even presented her with her shoes and the whole routine felt oddly wrong. Did the collar of her shirt used to strangle her so much? Were shoes always so confining?

She chanced a glance at herself in the mirror and was almost shocked to see regular old Morty (plus a thick blinking collar that _still_ drew her eye like a magnet) looking back at her. A little pale, maybe and there was something wrong with her eyes, but by far the strangest thing was how Morty couldn’t quite reconcile that the normal looking girl in the mirror was _her._ She didn’t feel like that Morty anymore; the one who at least tried to go to school and stared longingly at Jessica and could spend hours scrolling through her phone.

She felt _different_. And maybe she was. All Rick’s bruises and hickeys were carefully hidden. But under her clothes she was still his - the proof of that was unmistakable.

With a scoff and a shrug, she turned from the mirror to watch with interest while Rick dressed himself mechanically, the lean, intimidating, naked man doing his clothes to become the genius, multiverse-renowned scientist. It wasn’t exactly a transformation – Rick didn’t stop being Rick just because he took his clothes off – but he wore that lab coat like it was armor.

Her cut her a smirk and a half raised unibrow at her pointed gaze and then he grabbed up her hand, gave her a glance she didn’t have time to digest, and shot another portal, tugging her through.

She had been expecting Rick’s bedroom. That was her life now. The bathroom and his bedroom. Somehow she had expected to spend a long time tethered to his bed, maybe even as long as she had in the bunker, at least a couple more days just the two of them pretending the rest of the world didn’t exist.

Instead she stumbled out into the garage.

Her whole body jerked with how suddenly her legs locked up and she did her best to ignore the flip-flop her stomach kept turning over and over. The garage was still _overwhelming_ , just like every new change was to her now that she was so… sensitive. But it wasn’t as bad as that first time he’d brought her there. That useless spiral of impractical anxiety still tore through her like she was made of paper but at least she didn’t start hyperventilating.

Rick turned back to look at her and his face was tinged around the edges with something soft. “Come here, bud, you’re alright,” he whispered, wrapping his arm around her, leading her back to his work desk, and easing her into his swivel chair. With a glance at the dark, cramped space under his desk, Morty realized it was easier to focus on the horrible things she’d done under there the _last_ time she was in the garage than the nebulous chemicals in her brain screaming she was in danger even though she _knew_ there was nothing to be afraid of, no more so than normal at least, maybe even less with Rick hovering over her with clear eyes and no outward signs of malice.

She heaved a big sigh and let Rick catch her gaze. He was leaning over to keep their eyes level and the pride that sparkled in his ice-blue irises made it worth the effort to keep her cool. “Just one second, buddy,” he said and Morty would have sat there for him - _pounding heart or not_ \- forever.

His hands smoothed over her cheeks and around her jaw bone, cool fingers trailing down her neck until they traced the edge of the collar, those bright eyes sparking with something almost like regret. Then there was a quick beep and a little _snick_ and suddenly her neck was _unbearably_ light.

The cool air of the garage felt _indecent_ against skin so long kept undercover and her hands rushed up to grasp the place the collar should have been, a strange out-of-body awareness creeping in when her fingertips didn’t find the familiar bulk of metal but sank right through the air and touched her own clammy skin.

Morty was vividly reminded of the dream that used to haunt her when she was younger – the one where she showed up to class to do a presentation except her notecards were blank and her poster board was a disaster and she didn’t realize she was standing up there stuttering in her underwear until everyone started laughing.

Blindly she grasped for her pendant, desperate for something to hold onto, the familiar shape of it slotting into her palm like a lifeline.

Morty must have made some kind of pained noise because Rick dropped the collar in an open drawer and sank his hands into her hair, pressing her against his stomach and soothing her with little _shush_ es. She wrapped her arms around his waist and smooshed her face against the rough knit of his sweater to keep from floating away – she was suddenly just _too damn light_.

“I know bud, I hate to see it go too,” he murmured, petting her hair, and Morty didn’t have the emotional wherewithal to understand or express what she was feeling and why she was suddenly so pained but she didn’t think her and Rick were on the same page. She didn’t – _god_ – she didn’t want it back, _did she_? “When you’re older, Morty, I’ll put it on and never take it off,” he promised darkly and she was so confused by the barren stretch of skin on her neck taking up all her attention that she didn’t know whether that statement was soothing or frightening in the extreme.

He let her compose herself – just a minute or two, she was determined to seem emotionally stable even if she wasn’t actually _at all_ – before she pulled away and Rick smiled down at her almost gently. “Come on, bud.”

She stood and he wrapped his arm around her shoulder and then he was leading her towards the door to the kitchen.

And it was such a familiar gesture – _exactly_ the easy slouch of his shoulder curved over hers as he pulled her along to match his pace, walking back into the house after an adventure and rambling some half-aborted joke – that it didn’t occur to her to dig in her heels or speak a word of protest until it was too late. The door opened and the world shrank down to a spiral of overstimulation.

The real world. She’d forgotten what it felt like to be in a space not _owned_ by Rick. Then again (her thoughts revolted violently) what space _wasn’t_ owned by Rick? He took over every room he entered, conquered every planet with his intellect, and the house (that used to feel like hers) had been _his_ for long enough that the kitchen belonged to him just as much she did.

But _mom_ was in the kitchen and she hadn’t seen her face – _any_ other face but Rick’s - in so long it seemed oddly unfamiliar. Had her hair always been so blond? Were her eyes always that bright? What did that little look she cut over to the two of them mean - that slight twitch at the corner of her mouth when her gaze dropped for the smallest second from Rick’s eyes to somewhere around Morty’s hairline?

Morty had been gone for _so long_. Surely, even with whatever Rick had told them to excuse her absence, she would get some kind of ‘welcome home’, right?

“Hey you two, just in time.” Mom was leaned against the counter and pouring wine into a glass and instead of acknowledging Morty’s presence - instead of making any kind of eye contact at all - she quirked an eyebrow at Rick and plucked a bottle of beer out of the fridge.

Rick accepted the offering with a, “Thanks, sweetie,” and Morty stood rooted in place while mom turned and sauntered out of the kitchen.

“Breathe, Morty,” Rick whispered against her ear and thank god her body was programed to obey him because she gasped in a frantic breath she desperately needed. Had the kitchen always been this big and bright? And did the tiles always undulate in sickening waves? Her fist tightened in his lab coat – a desperate line to safety – and she did her best to let the long, soothing strokes Rick’s firm hand ran down her back calm her down.

“Hurry up you guys, it’s starting!” Summer shouted from the living room and Morty nearly jumped out of her skin before her knees went weak. Rick must have noticed too because his arm curved, tucking her more pointedly against his side and a distant ringing started blocking up her ears with a high pitched hum.

“Rick…?” she barely breathed, the word getting stuck in her dry mouth, but she could hardly hear herself anyways.

Rick’s face swam before her and he looked so unexpectedly kind and patient and warm that she threw her arms around his shoulder and hid her face against his neck. He dropped to his knees – she felt the vibration of the floor meeting his kneecaps, that’s how close she plastered herself to him – and held her tight against his chest.

“You’re doing so good, Morty,” he whispered against her hair and his encouraging words nearly made her cry.

By the time she’d stopped hyperventilating and released her death clench on Rick’s shoulders (fun fact: trying to keep a panic attack quiet was _extremely_ not fun), he had apparently finished off his first beer, tossing the empty into the bin and opening the fridge to grab another.

Then he started walking towards the living room slowly, looking back at her pointedly, and she had the choice to stay alone in the too bright/too colorful/ _too much_ kitchen by herself or cling to his lab coat and follow him.

It wasn’t even really a choice. The only sure point in all of human existence was Rick.

Morty let him lead the way into the dark living room and she was so glad she didn’t need to squint – hoped _desperately_ that the dim lighting would hide her bloodless face – and the words ‘ _keep it together_ ’ repeated in her head like they were a magic spell. She didn’t… she couldn’t _make a scene_ … not when mom was shooting that too happy look at Rick as he patted her shoulder when he passed and Summer’s eyes were glued to her phone and somehow _no one_ was phased by the girl they hadn’t seen in weeks walking into the living room like the last month never happened.

Morty refused to let go of Rick even while she sidestepped between Summer’s knees and the couch, following Rick as he took the shortest route to his favorite spot at the end of the sofa, positive as she was that if she let go even for the briefest moment, Morty would fall straight through the floor. She’d just disappear through the carpet and the pipes and the cement foundation, tumbling out right back into the bunker where she was undoubtedly asleep right now and having some hyper-realistic dream.

The terror that gripped her at the thought sent her tripping over her own shoes and she barely caught herself with both hands on the coffee table with a loud _bam_.

She’d been avoiding looking too hard at Summer. She didn’t think she could handle it if her sister had that same distant, apathetic, almost _bored_ face as mom. But when her palms hit the table, she turned on reflex at Summer’s little scoff.

For some reason, the first stupid thought that popped into Morty’s head was, ‘ _she’s changed her hair_ ’. It hung loose instead of in the ponytail Summer usually favored. And the ends were dyed pink.

“Jeez, learn to walk, Morty,” she taunted, and even though Morty knew Summer’s voice wasn’t half as biting as it might have been before ( _before_ before), her eyes never lifted from her phone and something small and apparently fragile was vaporized in Morty’s stomach and replaced with snakes.

Morty might have laid like that forever, half sprawled across the coffee table while tears gathered unwanted in her eyes, but Rick chuckled a little, grumbled “Such a klu- _uuuugh_ -tz,” and grabbed her by her upper arm, hefting her easily up and giving a little shove until her weak knees collapsed underneath her and she landed in the middle of the couch.

Rick’s weight dipped the cushion next to hers and Morty wondered briefly about the youngest person to die of a heart attack and whether she would be breaking that record in the very near future.

Rick slung his arm on top of the couch, the same way he always did (used to? … _did_ ) and he tilted his head at her, quirking his eyebrow like he was asking, ‘ _you good_?’

Morty nodded numbly for lack of any better option, turning her head back to the TV. And even though she didn’t make a habit of seeking out physical contact from him in front of mom and Summer (she was so _so_ scared they’d notice, they’d see something there, they’d _find out_ ), she scooted into his side. She was _immensely_ glad he dragged his arm off the top of the couch and let it fall over her shoulders of his own volition. She had been trying to figure out a way for her to reach up and yank it around herself without drawing too much attention.

Before that evening – that insane, horrible evening - Morty had never realized how hypnotizing the TV flashes were in a dark room if you weren’t staring straight at the screen. She kept her eyes carefully trained on a blank spot of wall two feet above the moving pictures and carefully counted out her breaths. If she tilted her head a bit, resting her cheek against Rick’s chest, she could smell him – familiar and safe and grounding – and she slowly worked herself away from the edge of a full-fledged panic attack and into something charged with adrenaline but… manageable.

So, nobody had missed her… not even Summer who had lately been so nice.

That was… well Morty hadn’t expected Rick to be _reprimanded_ or anything – god knew he could get away with anything – but she had been hoping for _something._ Not… not just sitting around and watching Game of Drones (an alternate dimension’s take on the popular show featuring an entirely robot cast – Rick called it a work of art) like it was any normal day of the week.

And Morty was so behind on episodes she didn’t even know what the fuck was going on. _Jeez,_ talk about spoilers.

A burble of hysterical laughter threatened to crawl up her throat and Morty struggled to swallow it down. Why was she worried about _spoilers_ when everything else, _literally her entire life,_ was so fucked up?

She had a weird flash of memory: her on the couch and pressing into Rick’s side while processing the _last_ massive paradigm shift in her life. It was right around when Rick and her started doing… whatever it was they were doing. After he’d strapped her down and pumped her full of nanobots and gotten her off and taken her out for fucking ice cream, of all things.

And he’d told her – he’d practically _promised_ her - it was all likely to happen again…

At the time, she had known there was a choice: go upstairs and cope with the new aspects of their relationship on her own or stay and shove at those new boundaries for the affection she so desperately needed after he’d hurt her and made her feel good and mixed up her brain like fucking scrambled eggs all in one fell swoop.

Maybe if she had gone upstairs and acted distant or angry or scared or any of the things some _normal_ teenager would do if their grandpa started coming onto them, she might not be in this position right now. But she hadn’t. She’d thrown herself at him, soaking him up like a sponge and letting him twist everything in her life until he was at the center. As if he hadn’t been already.

In the end, her body made the choice: her fingers wouldn’t unclench from her death grip on his lab coat and her legs would never carry her away from the even sound of his heartbeat, loud where she pressed her ear to his chest. Everything else was just… too confusing.

That little glance Summer shot her from the corner of her eye: was it concern or suspicion? The long sigh mom breathed while she swirled her wine: was that the precursor to a night of heavier drinking or just a deep exhalation? Morty used to _know_ those things - she _needed_ to know those things for her own survival - but suddenly every file but Rick’s were missing and her hands felt stupid and clumsy in her lap and she was pretty sure she might start screaming soon if no one was going to fucking say something.

Clinging to him like he was a scrap of wood in a stormy shipwreck, Morty made up her mind to trust Rick, to lean into whatever he was doing and do her best to keep up whatever act she was supposed to play because mom and Summer were suddenly so foreign and she was _drowning._

Rick’s hand shifted on her back and then his long fingers were dragging through her hair in seemingly thoughtless strokes and that overinflated, about-to-bust feeling siphoned out of her like air farting out of a balloon.

If this was what Rick wanted, then he could just figure everything out for her. She wouldn’t think about it. She was _good_ at not thinking about stuff, particularly the kind of traumatizing stuff she’d learned was better to shove down deep enough that she never had to look at it again.

With a quavering sigh, Morty tried her best to relax against Rick’s side. This was happening, whatever _this_ was. Her mom and her sister were indifferent to her absence, Rick was taking over her entire life, and Morty… well…

Now there was no choice. She had to stay. There was no comfort for her in solitude, hadn’t she just learned that down in the bunker? She was _sick_ of solitude. She was sick of working things out on her own and feeling alone and isolated and if Rick was willing to be a pillar for her to lean against, why would she ever turn him away?

And wasn’t that just the problem? Rick was a nuclear weapon; her worst friend and her best enemy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the extended break between chapter updates. To get too into it, I had something written that I _thought_ was going to be the middle of the story but as I progressed, it felt more and more like the end. Soooooo I wound up pushing that stuff back and having to figure out a whole new middle chunk. ಠωಥ
> 
> Since I want to give that middle chunk the attention it deserves, the next few updates might be a little less regular than weekly but I'll do my best to keep things moving and I promise I haven't abandoned this story. Literally I have most of the end already sitting on my computer as well as two almost completed oneshot follow-ups. Guys, what the fuck am I doing with my life?
> 
> In the meantime, I appreciate your patience and thank you so much for reading!


	10. Chapter Ten

A month and a half. That was how long Morty had been locked up. Forty-seven days. She had counted them out on the calendar in the kitchen, her finger touching each day she’d spent underground. She’d missed _the entire_ month of May. Every single day of it.

Forty-seven days. It felt like so much longer than that - she would have guessed she had spent a lifetime down in the bunker, but the facts told her it was only a bit more than six weeks. An arbitrary number. One that only made sense to Rick. And slipping back into the old usual routine was slow, the adjustment a rocky path to follow.

For the first week, she found herself pacing back to Rick’s room to seek safe haven when she felt too overwhelmed - when mom mentioned Summer’s graduation ceremony and then laughed like it was a something Morty should remember too. When Summer teased her about a supposed crush on the cashier at the gas station even though Morty hadn’t seen a guy her own age since April. When she got her report card and was shocked to find out she hadn’t _completely_ flunked her sophomore year despite missing the last month and a half of school with only math class marked in red and a note informing her she’d be retaking it over the summer.

When things got _especially_ bad – when mom looked _through_ her when she stammered out a scratchy ‘good morning’, when Summer told her she could borrow whatever she wanted from her closet because she’d already packed up all her favorites and taken them _somewhere else_ , when Rick watched her flounder to answer simple questions at the breakfast table with a look on his face like he _loved_ watching her squirm – she’d lock herself in her room and clench the topaz stone dangling at her wrist, wondering if it would be easier to just disappear entirely. To vanish from this universe and never come back. To drop everything and everyone and become someone completely new – someone who hadn’t ever spent _forty-seven days_ locked up underground by the only person who might… the only person she _wanted_ to love her. The only person she really loved.

But it didn’t come up often.

Between work and her online courses, mom was always preoccupied. Even when she was sitting down to eat whatever meal Rick had made for dinner (the only chore he’d taken charge of and actually mostly did himself instead of sicing a meeseeks on it), mom’s eyes were glued to her tablet, scrolling through long, complicated textbooks with lots of diagrams – _studying_ Morty eventually realized - only bothering to glance up if Rick was the one addressing her.

And Summer was gone for huge chunks of time - her and her spaceship and her new dip-dyed pink hair disappearing for days on end, most of Morty’s contact with her being the update texts in the family group chat that Summer sent with almost the same (obviously timed) consistency Rick did.

In free moments – laying quietly in her bed before Rick dragged her out of it for one thing or another, sitting alone at the dining table in the early morning and eating slightly stale cereal, standing in the shower and watching water circle the drain - Morty let herself wonder…

Sometimes… it kind of seemed like everyone was acting like she hadn’t been gone at all.

Except… how did that work? She _had_ been gone; memories of the bunker were still fresh and vaguely haunting. _Fourty-seven days’_ worth of memories. Unless… she’d made it up in her head? The multiverse was filled with shit Morty couldn’t understand – hell, Rick’s favorite video game Roy could imitate reality so well you’d think you had lived a lifetime in the span of a few minutes. And Morty wouldn’t put it past Rick to fuck with her mind like that.

But then again, the _calendar_ couldn’t lie to her. The date on her phone wouldn’t be wrong. And even Rick couldn’t somehow convince her to lead two completely separate lives with no cognitive connection between the two, right? Probably. _Maybe._

If she were some other Morty – a _boy_ Morty _–_ she would have assumed Rick had snatched up a replacement for a couple weeks. Morty watched the topaz stone glint in the sunlight streaming in through her bedroom window and scoffed. No way would the Rics let _Rick_ borrow a Morty just to keep _her_ locked up in his basement for a month. She thoroughly crossed that idea off her mental list, crumpled up the paper, and tossed it into one of the many holes perforating her stomach.

Because the longer she thought about it, the _how_ stopped mattering so much – as it always was with Rick, the less she knew the better. The point was Rick did it… somehow… and got away with it. Nobody noticed anything. Nobody said anything. Apparently life went on without her.

And while Morty was frustrated and unaccountably hurt, that eventually dimmed to a sort of muted acceptance. At least mom and Summer weren’t wane or hollowed-out the way they had been when she’d last seen them the day she climbed down into the bunker. Whatever had happened to them in the interim must have been good - they both looked happy (or at least some closer shade to it). _So what_ if Morty had spent a month and a half locked up under their feet? If it meant they wouldn’t be miserable again, she’d spend the rest of her life down there.

No, what became shockingly more obvious with every waking moment was that Morty only _really_ mattered to Rick. But to Rick… well if she read between the lines – _really_ looked for something there… she meant _a lot_. …She could hope. And that revelation made her feel even more justified throwing herself into whatever tasks he set her. Though something else weighed into that decision as well: her anxiety was much worse in the relatively safe confines of the house than it was out on adventures with Rick.

It didn’t make any sense but sitting around the dining room table and eating lunch with mom and Summer was a billion times more likely to send her into a panic attack than an alien with a gun. At least she could _shoot_ the alien with a gun. Killing her social anxiety (amplified by a thousand now with all the missing time) was a much more complicated matter and would probably require a psychiatrist but Rick had laid down the law about _specialists_ when the school counselor suggested they send Morty to a speech therapist for her stutter.

And whereas before (pre bunker, post _before_ before) Morty might occasionally wind up on the couch watching TV with Summer, or hang out in the bathroom to try to pick up tricks while her sister put on makeup, or even – on a few prized occasions – stay up late and look through magazines with Summer on her bed while they talked; her sister’s company no longer gave her that almost giddy, all-is-right-in-the-world feeling that it used to. Not that Summer was around much anyways, and when she was, it was usually only in passing - to take a shower, to grab a change of clothes, maybe a quick stop with Morty and Rick to get ice cream and then off again for half a week or more.

Which was fine. Morty was _happy_ for Summer. She seemed like she was finally finding her niche and forging a new sense of confidence. Morty tried not to miss her too much.

And anyways, Rick was the best company she could ask for (she told herself heartily anytime any other thought encroached upon her mind). Most days he was the only person she interacted with at all, let alone on any meaningful level, and well… that was just fine... Honestly that wasn’t really different from her life before the bunker, anyways, she was only just now becoming aware of it because she was inexplicably starved for his attention. Rick too was being uncharacteristically open about the fact that he valued her company (not with words, _never_ with word, but he was always asking for her help or telling her to sit with him and watch TV or dragging her through a portal for things he probably could have done alone) And if he was the only one who could stand her, that was good enough for her. He was all she needed.

It took some time, and _a lot_ of conscious effort, but eventually Morty stopped jolting when mom’s voice shouted up the stairs for help setting the table. And she suppressed the cringe to duck out from Summer’s friendly shoulder pats. And gradually her room stopped feeling like someone else’s and started feeling almost like hers again. _Almost_.

And if sometimes, on the rare mornings she woke up _without_ Rick’s weight around her, she’d freeze up - terrified with her eyes screwed closed, dreading that she would open them to see that too familiar view of the dim bunker with that one florescent light – she’d press her head into her pillow and trace the smooth fabric of worn bed sheets and tell herself that all that was in the past. It was _over_.

As long as she didn’t do anything else to set Rick off.

 

* * *

 

 

It was a miracle Morty made it to the first day of summer school.

The night before, Rick had dragged her out of a deep sleep in the middle of the night to portal to a planet with a thick layer of red slime so deep it came up to Morty’s navel at its shallowest point. They trudged (and swam and floundered) through the muck for hours until Morty found the barbed weed Rick had been searching for, the half-sentient thing nearly drowning her in self-defense.

By the time they portaled back home, it was three in the morning. It took _forever_ to shower all the goop off and it was so thick and nasty it clogged the drain. She had to drag Rick into the bathroom so he could fix the disaster she’d turned the tub into before mom woke up and tried to get ready for work even though Morty was practically dead on her feet. But inviting Rick into the bathroom was all the go-ahead he needed to settle her onto the sink and rock into her, deep and slow and torturously good.

When they collapsed onto his bed, the sun was just starting to filter in through his open blinds.

Morty made a point to set her alarm, triple checking that she’d set it for 8 _am_ even though Rick kept shooting her disbelieving looks as he sipped from a mostly empty bottle of clear liquor.

“You’ll sleep thro- _ooough-_ ugh it, Morty, just give up and ditch.” That idea was particularly tempting when he tugged her against his side until her cheek rested on his bare shoulder, his arm curved along her back, his fingers loose and accepting when she weaved her own in the gaps between his.

“You really – Rick, you want to run around the universe with a high school drop-out?” She trailed off with a yawn, soothed by the slow chuckle rumbling through Rick’s chest below her ear.

“There’s plenty of worse things out there, Morty, believe me.”

And maybe that comforted her a little bit. It was always good to be reminded that Rick didn’t exactly care that she was a moron except in the way that it directly benefited him and his stupid (or rather _her_ stupid) brainwaves. But Morty didn’t _want_ to be a high school drop-out. She was already dumb, she didn’t need to add flunkie to her repertoire all because she’d let a sociopathic old man make all her decisions for her.

So she blindly fumbled for her phone and checked one last time that she’d set her alarm for the right time before she finally settled her head down on his chest and switched off like a light.

She woke much later with a jerk - some weird nightmare about plants and Jell-O molds scaring her awake - and it took her a whole minute of heavy breathing to realize the sun was too high and bright for it to be before her alarm was supposed to go off. Groggily she reached for her phone.

It was a quarter after ten. Class started at nine. _Fuck._

She swiped open her clock app and saw that the alarm had been turned off. She must have done it in her sleep – it wouldn’t be the first time Morty made the executive decision to fuck off on any morning plans when she was unconscious. Except she had _no_ memories of the shrill beeps of the alarm. Usually there was something - some little snatch of blearily scrambling for her phone, pleading with a non-existent god to stop the awful noise – but there was nothing but the dream about Jell-O and the long (but not nearly long enough) stretch of sleep.

Morty spared one heavy lidded glare towards Rick who was face-down and partially sideways, his torso stretching towards her, his hand wrapped around her bicep like a vice. She couldn’t _prove_ it and she’d never ask, but the suspicion was beating her over the back of her head and threatening to give her brain damage.

With a sigh (more resigned than annoyed) she turned over the thought of ditching in her head. Rick would no doubt cover for her if she asked - hell, he’d be thrilled about it. It was one of his favorite things: her choosing him over anything and everything else.

And it was too easy to imagine. She could curve her back against his chest and drag his arm over her waist and slip right off back to sleep. They’d wake up hours later, much better rested, and probably do the groggy morning sex routine that might be Morty’s favorite way to fuck – the one where they both laid next to each other and moved slow and calm and steady until the quiet, peaceful pleasure exploded into white-out bliss.

Afterwards Rick would probably make her pancakes, if she asked.

Morty groaned into her pillow and kicked her legs free of the deliciously warm sheets. She couldn’t let Rick get his way _all_ the time. It wasn’t _healthy_. For either of them. Not that anything they were doing was. _Jeezus._

So even though she was exhausted, even though she was half-sure her legs would crumple under her own weight, even though her eyes were so heavy she could barely keep them open, she made up her mind and threw off the covers.

Rick’s deep and even breathing went on undisturbed as she wiggled to the edge of the bed, the sound of his light snoring almost enough to convince Morty to change her mind. But she gently unclasped his hand from around her arm (it had to be some ingrained instinct of his that Morty knew she shouldn’t find endearing but did anyways) and stumbled to her feet, dressing quickly and quietly.

The house was silent when she creaked open Rick’s bedroom door and peered out into the hallway, irrationally afraid mom would be standing in the hallway with her arms crossed, a look of disgust twisting up her face. But the house didn’t smell like coffee (mom’s morning ritual/addiction that she had handed down to Summer) so Morty knew she was in the clear. Mom was still asleep. And Summer was probably still off-planet. She had been since Friday.

Still, Morty tried to keep her footfalls quiet as she tip-toed into the foyer and grabbed her backpack, easing the front door closed behind her and breathing out a long sigh she hadn’t realized she’d been holding in.

Morty’s stamina still wasn’t what it was before the bunker but her legs remembered the familiar rhythm of running and she took off like a shot, skidding a bit on the dewy grass but catching herself before she skinned her palms on the sidewalk. The day was already humid and hot and her lungs burned with exertion but sprinting for a reason that wasn’t life-or-death was almost refreshing, even if she was regretting getting out of bed more with every step she took away from the house.

By the time she banged into the glass front doors of the high school, she was sweaty and exhausted - and she hated to think of what she’d look like walking into class more than an hour late and dripping sweat -but the office secretary had glared at her when she slammed into the building so it was too late to turn back.

The school was eerily quiet in the summer. The squeak of Morty’s sneakers against linoleum sounded extra loud in the echoing silence as she hurried to Mr. Goldenfold’s math room. Only a handful of classrooms were in use housing the smattering of kids who’d fallen behind during the school year. She only spotted one other person roaming the hall - or the tail-half of them anyways. Just as she turned a corner, a streak of brown hair and a blur of yellow disappeared around the corner at the opposite end of the hall and something strange and uneasy prickled up Morty’s spine but she was already skidding to a halt in front of the math room door and it was easier to let herself ignore the anxiety that was _always_ simmering at a low boil since the bunker than chase down a hapless student just cause something seemed off.

When she stumbled into the classroom, every head turned to her and the weight of so many eyes after so long with only Rick to worry about made her suddenly, violently nauseous. She was still adjusting, still re-learning how to handle enclosed spaces, and her heightened pulse combined with the bone-deep memory of hours of uneasiness sitting in the math room and staring at a board covered in equations she couldn’t understand triggered an instinctive flood of adrenaline without any good outlet to flush it out of.

The walls bent and curled around her, crowding her in. There were too many people, too many expressions to read, too many potential outcomes. Oh jeez, she was having a panic attack. She was having a panic attack in front of _everyone_.

‘ _Say something_!’ the part of her that wasn’t completely broken urged vehemently from the back of her brain. ‘ _Say anything_!’

“I – Sorry I’m –” she grit out, swallowing the surge of bile and staring steadfastly through the floor. If the run hadn’t made her flushed, she was a tomato now, and she could feel sweat dripping down her temple, the salt stinging her eyes. Never before had she so vividly regretted the decision to leave the comfort of Rick’s bed for the crippling over-exposure of class.

“Go back to your seat, Morty,” Mr. Goldenfold sighed, and Morty nodded stiffly, speed walking to the back of the room, catching her foot on someone’s overturned backpack, stumbling into a classmate who groused “Watch it!” and shoved her off, before she was able to throw herself into her unoccupied desk.

Morty fished a notebook out of her backpack and flipped it open - more to look busy than any intention of actually taking notes – and was surprised to find a sheet of loose paper already on her desk. She frowned at the worksheet covered in equations and fought the wave of anxiety that always overtook her if she spent too long staring at a page covered in numbers, finding a worn down pencil at the bottom of her backpack and resignedly going to fill in her name at the top of the paper.

Except… her name was already written down. ‘ _Morty Smith_ ’. Morty’s hand froze, pencil tip touching the place the first leg of the ‘M’ started.

“What?” Morty half-whispered to herself.

She stared down at the name in confusion. It was _her_ handwriting… but when did she…?

“If _Morty_ would follow along with the class instead of whispering to herself -” Mr. Goldenfold loudly interrupted her staggering thought process and she jerked, realizing her teacher and half of the class were turned in their seats staring at her. “- I could explain to the class why the Pythagorean theorem will be so useful to you in your adult lives, unless you have something more important to share? Morty?”

“N – no,” Morty breathed. “Sorry.”

Under the weight of Mr. Goldenfold’s vacant gaze, Morty sank lower into her seat. Once he seemed appeased by her soul-deep wish to vanish out of existence, he turned to the board. “Back to what I was saying,” he continued but Morty was too embarrassed to follow along – too distracted by the burning of her cheeks and the visible pulsing of her heart underneath her sternum.

She cut her eyes back to her paper and frowned at the scribbled handwritting. She must have written her name down automatically, some instinct honed into her brain from years of public school. That’s all it was. She was so flustered and tired and out of it when she sat down, she’d filled in her name without actively thinking about it. She did shit like that all the time. Like when she finished mentally waking up at the dining table with a bowl of cereal half eaten in front of her. Or when she ducked behind cover before her brain fully recognized the sound of gunfire.

With a shrug, Morty pushed the weird stomach lurching feeling to the back of her mind and took a surreptitious glance around at her classmates.

She was fairly sure no one was _actually_ staring at her anymore, but if sure _felt_ like they were. There were too many people. She still hadn’t fully adjusted to mom and Summer yet, still felt like the living room was too crowded with just the four of them, and now she was in a room with _thirty_ other kids – thirty other people fidgeting and breathing and thinking – and it felt too _loud_.

She could smell the Axe body spray on the boy two seats in front of her. A girl with a headband kept sniffling up her snot in little disgusting snorts every ninety seconds. The boy in the seat behind her kept jangling his foot against the bookrest under her seat, the motion shaking the whole desk, including her.

Was school always this overwhelming? Or was that just _everything_ to her now? And why did she ever submit herself to getting glared at by Mr. Goldenfold when she could be blissfully asleep curled up next to Rick?

It wasn’t like sitting through the lesson was going to do her brain any favors - the numbers scrawled across the board were practically gibberish to her and despite her occasional attempts to follow along, whatever Mr. Goldenfold kept doing with that little extended check mark thing didn’t make any sense to her. She’d missed something important, something he must have covered at the beginning of class, and now ( _as always_ ) Morty was hopelessly behind.

The highlight of the day was the half hour lunch break Morty spent hidden in a bathroom stall in the empty locker room just to get some fucking space.

It helped that the second half of class she passed the time by thinking about Rick, fiddling with the pendant hanging at her neck, skimming her fingers over the bare skin around her neck that still felt raw and overexposed without the collar.

By two in the afternoon he was probably awake and wondering where she was. Well, maybe not _wondering_ ; he always knew where she was. The nano-bots were a tracking device, she _knew_ that. Just like she knew she probably shouldn’t be reassured by that complete disregard for her privacy but Rick keeping tabs on her kinda felt like she was being favored by the gods (or in Rick’s case: _god_ ). And that tracker had saved her ass on too many occasions to count. So of all the fucked up things Rick made her put up with, the tracker ranked pretty low on the list of what concerned her.

And thanks to the tracker, Rick would know the minute she started her walk home – giving him plenty of time to prepare for whatever he had planned for the rest of the day. Morty had a feeling she’d be whisked off on another errand the second she walked through the door – the barbed weed they’d collected the night before/that morning was the last item on a list of things Rick had needed to finish up some complicated project he’d begun the day before after a long, loud phone call that had left him angry and bizarrely motivated.

But she was tired. She wanted to curl up and take a nap. Or really she wanted to screw around with Rick and _then_ take a nap. She was horny - she was _always_ horny – and it was surprisingly easy to talk him into a quickie, but it was a lot harder to convince him to let her get some rest when he had a multiverse to dominate. Besides, she should probably consider herself lucky that he hadn’t already portaled into the classroom to drag her away.

Somehow that thought led to a lengthy day-dream where Rick - looking murderous and intimidating – stepped through a swirl of green and dragged her to the front of the class to bend her over Mr. Goldenfolds desk. In her fantasy, the judgmental, horrified faces of her classmates were a well-earned relief despite the crippling self-hatred they inspired. Because if Rick would just hold her down and fuck her where everyone could see, then they’d all know – _they’d finally know_ – how sick and depraved she really was, and that horrible secret didn’t have to eat her from the inside out anymore.

The end-of-class bell startled her out of her reverie and her cheeks felt hot when the fog of arousal faded and she reevaluated her fucked up fantasy. They flushed even hotter when she weighed the benefits of asking Rick to portal them into the classroom in the middle of the night to play out a safer shade of her daydream. She shelved that idea for the moment doing her best to put it in the back of her mind where Rick wouldn’t be able to skim it from her thoughts. If he knew the full extent of her perversion, he might be tempted to enact the whole thing – including the horrified audience - and even though the _thought_ of it made her clench her thighs, the reality of it would probably send her into cardiac arrest.

With a firm mental shake, Morty gathered her loose, unmarked paper into her backpack and joined the shuffle out into the hallway.

As usual, Morty did her best to avoid direct eye-contact with anyone – an easy task when most people’s eyes slid right over her like she was a continuation of the wall – and she nearly made it all the way to the front exit when a familiar whiff of perfume caught her nose; flowery and sweet like sugared violets.

_Jessica_.

Morty’s neck cracked in her knee-jerk reaction of pivoting her head in the direction of the streak of red hair she caught in her periphery.

Jessica had gotten even more beautiful in the time Morty had spent in the bunker. She was wearing a summery dress, one that showed off her freckled shoulders and brought out the green of her eyes. Maybe it was the sunlight filtering through the glass doors or maybe it was just _Jessica_ but her hair was glowing with a halo, the edges radiant copper as her face scrunched up in a friendly smile.

“- here, Morty?”

“Wha –” Morty stammered, realizing too late that Jessica’s mouth had been moving, probably to speak, but Morty hadn’t caught a single word of it. _Jeez_ why was she always such an idiot?

But Jessica giggled like Morty’s complete stupidity wasn’t a massive turn-off. “I said, ‘what are you doing here?’”

“Oh I –” _fuck_ “I’m re-taking – I had to re-take math.” Well, if Jessica somehow hadn’t known she was dumb before, she definitely did _now_.

“That sucks.” Jessica frowned but it didn’t seem like a judge-y frown. Then again, what the fuck did Morty know? She had spent the last month and a half locked up in a bunker with no company but Rick. Maybe normal people didn’t have such intricacies to their frowns. Maybe Jessica only frowned when she was disgusted. Maybe Morty could wither into dust if she pictured it hard enough. “Mr. Goldenfold shouldn’t be allowed to teach, he’s terrible at it. Trisha had to re-take it too.”

Internally Morty melted in relief. If Jessica could forgive Trisha for being dumb, Morty was probably in the clear.

“Y – yeah he – I guess I just don’t understand it the way he teaches it.” _Wow, what a fucking lie_. “I – I’m trying to catch up though.” _And there when another one_. Time to change the subject. “What’re – what are you doing here?”

“Debate club,” Jessica answered, one of her slender, perfect fingers finding the curled tip of a lock of hair and twisting it. She stuck her tongue out a little and rolled her eyes and Morty was sure she would die of cuteness overload. How did Jessica _do_ that – be so charming and easy to talk to and _adorable_? “Lame, I know, but it’ll look good on college applications or _whatever_.”

Morty’s mouth dried up just like it always did when her teachers and classmates talked about ‘the future’ _._ _College applications_? Jessica may as well be talking about filing taxes for how much Morty could relate.

“Sounds fun,” Morty said weakly, completely at a loss, wracking her brain for _something_ to continue the conversation but she was coming up with nothing but blanks. What did other teenagers talk about? Was there a popular show on TV or some new celebrity gossip? Should she ask about what college Jessica wanted to go to or was that invasive - or worse: creepy? How did Morty knew how to talk down an angry Gazorpian but she couldn’t hold down a conversation with a girl in her own fucking grade?

All Morty could think of to talk about was that planet of red sludge and the vine that nearly killed her but that was the sort of shit that usually made Summer’s eyes go a little foggy with disinterest. “Uhm – yeah,” she finally stammered out after entirely too long. “That’s cool.”

Morty begged silently for death.

“You know, I’m pretty good at math.” Jessica shifted her weight and her arm brushed against Morty’s, her skin cool and smooth and porcelain pale in comparison to Morty’s uneven sunburn from two days prior when she helped Rick bury pipes filled with wires around the perimeter of the house.

“Oh that’s – that’s nice.” _What did that mean?!_

Jessica giggled again and something nervous and awful that was trying to parade itself as a laugh burbled out of Morty’s throat. “What I mean is, I can tutor you, if you want.”

“You – _wait what_?” Jessica was taller than Morty by at least half a head but somehow the look Jessica was cutting her was through her impossibly long, thick black eyelashes.

“Yeah!” Jessica lifted her hand again to fiddle with her bangs and Morty somewhat frantically smoothed her own hair down on impulse. “I might not be much better than Mr. Goldenfold but at least I’ll smell a little better.”

“ _Oh jeez, you_ do _smell good_ ,” Morty breathed, horrified that had come out of her mouth loud enough for green eyes to widen in surprise and completely shocked when Jessica’s response was a delighted laugh. “Wait - you’d really tutor me?”

That was just too good to be true. Morty was dreaming. She was _dead_. Rick didn’t hack that weed off her leg in time after all and she’d drowned in goop. (She thought that frantic hug he’d wrapped her up in had felt too sweet, too frantic, _too relieved_ to be Rick) And now Jessica was offering to spend time with Morty _outside of school_?

She had to be dead, it was the only explanation.

“Yeah, here, get out your phone.” Morty fumbled to pull her phone out of her back pocket and when the screen lit up, she was met with the familiar selfie she had taken with Rick, both of them making faces at the camera, Rick’s hard blue eyes boring into Morty like he knew exactly what she was doing.

She grimaced at the photo and did her best to ignore the stirring of unease rising the hair on the back on her neck. Her finger was too sweaty to unlock the screen but after three progressively more clumsy attempts, she finally got her code in right and dragged up a new contact.

“I’m not… smart,” she admitted a little lamely, glancing up to catch Jessica’s face twist in confusion and something almost like hurt but more outward directed. What was that expression? What did that mean? “And I – I don’t – I’m not a very good student.”

“Who told you that?” Jessica asked too seriously, taking the phone out of Morty’s hand, her fingers moving fast and graceful as she added her name and number.

“My family,” Morty answered immediately. “Teachers. _Everyone_. I mean, even tests and doctors and stuff.” Maybe she shouldn’t have said all that but it felt wrong to keep it to herself. She _wasn’t_ smart. And unlike Rick who directly benefited from her stupidity, Jessica would inevitably find Morty’s lack of intelligence trying just like everyone else did.

But Jessica huffed out her nose and shook her head, handing Morty’s phone back. She’d put the little redheaded emoji girl on either side of her name and Morty felt like her heart might break.

“Well, you don’t have to be _smart_ to pass Mr. Goldenfold’s class, believe me. If _Brad_ can do it, anyone can.” Morty wasn’t sure how to feel about that statement when it might have been one of the nicest things someone who wasn’t Rick (or Ric) had ever said to her. “Come over to my house and I’ll show you. Maybe after we study we’ll watch something on Netflix. You know… just… hangout. Make a night of it.”

That sounded – Morty’s brain froze and she had to force herself to reboot - that sound a helluva lot like a _date_. “ _Holy shit_ ,” Morty breathed under her breath but quickly readjusted her tone. “I – yeah that would be… nice...” Jessica’s smile was so bright it nearly hurt Morty’s eyes to look at but she didn’t dare turn away until Jessica started backing down the hallway looking reluctant.

“I’ve gotta get to debate but…” She smiled again - something softer and smaller - brushing her hair behind her ear. “Text me when you’re free, okay?” And then she was gone, spinning away to jog around the corner, her short skirt flipping up and showing off pale, perfect thighs that had Morty’s mouth watering.

What… just… happened…?

Morty must have blacked out or – or tripped through a fucking portal without knowing and wound up in another dimension. Because how else was she looking down at the ten digits of Jessica’s phone number, bracketed by those adorable little red-head emojis?

Jessica had… given Morty her number. How _completely unimaginable_. And the part of Morty that still clung to who she used to be before ( _before_ before) wanted to do a cartwheel. Or maybe six of them in a row, right there down the length of the school hallway until she flipped off the face of the earth.

Instead, she stumbled towards the school doors, dragging her feet in a daze.

Once she was out in the bright, unforgiving light of day, some of that giddy euphoria started to fade away, even as she kept her phone in her hand, eyes glued to the newly created contact. Morty _wasn’t_ the person she was before Rick blew into her life like a hurricane filled with poisonous fish. She wasn’t around on weekends to go to the mall, she was never going to pass math without Rick’s intervention one way or another, and when everyone started filling out applications for college next year, Morty wouldn’t be joining them.

Having a _friend_ (besides Rick) – wasn’t something Morty could handle right now.

Morty sighed and turned her feet towards home, every step grounding her closer in reality.

It wasn’t like she was _actually_ going to text Jessica. A study date would be an exercise in futility – Morty was _way_ too stupid and she didn’t want to risk Jessica finding that out, would hate it too much if that thin veneer of pity painted over her green eyes, just like it did with everyone else when Morty let on how far behind she’d fallen.

And even if they hung out, what could Morty possibly say to her? ‘ _You’re beautiful and perfect and I’m_ literally _the scum of the earth’_? They had almost nothing in common. The most interesting stories Morty could tell all involved Rick and somehow Morty didn’t like the idea of sharing those. They were _hers_ – hers to keep, hers to cherish; even the ones that didn’t end with her naked and wrapped around her grandfather.

Speaking of which, it was impossible anyways. Rick would throw a fit if she tried to go out for an evening to Jessica’s house – he knew too well that she had been crushing on the red-head for almost the entirety of her life and Rick would deny it until the end of the universe but he was definitely the jealous type. And if the field trip earned her a month and a half stay in the bunker, she trembled to imagine what Rick would do to her if he found out she’d gone out on something that was almost a date.

No, it was enough that Morty _had_ her number, that she had a tiny outlet for her imagination to run wild. She wouldn’t actually _use_ it. _Probably._ Not unless – but that wouldn’t happen. Morty was the most unlucky person in the multiverse. She’d never even get an opportunity.

By the time Morty drifted into the dark house and settled herself on the couch (phone still in hand), she had memorized the ten digits and burned them into her heart.

Even if she never used it, it was nice to feel… well not exactly _normal_ but something a little closer to it. Morty barely had any contacts in her phone and all of them were family. To finally have a _friend_ , one her age, one that wasn’t her grandpa – it kind of felt like an important moment. She sat up a little straighter and breathed in a long, deep breath, blinking around the dim room, drinking it in. She wanted to _remember_ this so she could cling to it later when mom wouldn’t meet her eyes over the dinner table - so it wasn’t only Rick’s hand on the back of her neck keeping her from melting into sludge.

Her thoughts slammed to a halt when the garage door swung open and Rick’s footfalls padded through the kitchen. Morty quickly dimmed her phone and arched her back to tuck it into her back pocket while Rick’s footsteps stopped at the fridge, glass bottles _ting_ ing together before Rick strutted into the living room holding a bottle of beer to his lips. Morty tried not to feel (or look) guilty as Rick’s eyes scanned her top to bottom with laser precision in a familiar sweep and she carefully boxed up all her thoughts about Jessica and their maybe-date, tucking them somewhere safe: behind the memory of how boring class was and how tired she had been since the morning and her most recent daydream featuring Rick. Just in case he _could_ read her mind.

“Did I just catch you looking at porn in the _living room_ , Moooooorty?” he rasped, steely blues narrowing in interest. Morty dolefully blinked once, willing her cheeks to stop heating under Rick’s penetrating stare. “Or is it something else that got you all flushed?”

“You mean – yeah, _the sun_?” she answered, raising her voice up at the end like _he_ was the one being weird and suspicious. He tilted his head slightly - like looking at her from a new angle might send all her secrets pouring out of her - and Morty did her best to look confused. Then she smiled, willing herself to bury the strange twinging of her conscience under a thin coat of humor. “It’s called ‘summer’, ever heard of it, Rick? It’s like a billion degrees out there.”

“Yeah, and you’re the idiot who trekked their ass to school even though every other self-respecting high schooler would have done the sa- _aaaugh-_ ne thing and _ditched_ ,” he answered flatly, padding closer, his unibrow still bent in a V. Then he burped and the lines melted from his forehead as he thrust out an open hand. “But there’s no time for you to cool off, Morty, we gotta take care of something.”

Morty slotted her smaller hand into his – the familiar callouses closing around her fingers in a reassuring grip, that spark of heat that _always_ dripped into her belly at the feel of his hand clasped around hers dulled by a tidal wave of guilt – and she feverishly told herself ‘ _it’s fine, Morty, you didn’t_ do _anything_ ’ but the grin that pulled up his cheeks (the one that spelled _fun_ and _trouble_ and _all the things she’d ever wanted her whole fucking life_ ) made the back of her brain amend the statement.

‘You didn’t do anything _yet_ ’.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all your patience! Enjoy awkward Morty at her best.
> 
> P.S. Look at this shit --> 👩🏻🦰   
> I wanted to fill this fucking note with redheads but it separates the _red_ from the _head_. (◔_◔)


	11. Chapter Eleven

“You – you and your… uh… dad… come here a lot?” Morty stammered, turning to the taciturn alien hovering next to her and wishing she could melt through the lush orange grass beneath her feet. _Ugh_ , that was a stupid question. And the Urganon at her side seemed to agree, sparing a millisecond of his time to turn his glare towards her before his eyes darted back to his obvious point of interest: Rick.

Morty exhaled a sigh slowly and bit down hard on her lower lip. Jeez, she’d never been good at small talk but ever since the bunker she’d been worse at it than ever. What did normal people (or in this case _aliens_ ) talk about? What had happened out in the multiverse while Morty had been locked up underground? She’d never met an Urganon before and she was starting to question whether he could even speak English but his dad (or whoever the older alien arguing with Rick was) seemed pretty fluent from the way they both rambled on, bickering loudly and attracting looks from passersby.

Morty cut the creature next to her another discreet glance out of the corner of her eyes before jerking them quickly back to the grass.

Morty had never seen any aliens like him but she got the impression he was young - maybe even a teenager like her - and Morty had come across enough lifeforms in her travels across the multiverse to stop feeling weird about finding his slightly off-human body attractive (including his backwards facing knees, extra eye, and sapphire blue scales), despite the cruel sneer he wore on his face.

Hell, maybe the sneer helped. It was Rick’s default expression, after all.

Plus the guy was _huge_. Taller-than-Rick huge. And despite the weird joints, his bare torso and arms looked mostly human and _very_ buff. Unfortunately, it was hard to appreciate him as a slightly misshapen, vaguely-aquatic Adonis when she was uncomfortably aware of how easy it would be for him to snap every bone in her body if the trade between his maybe-dad and Rick went awry, which seemed more likely with every passing second.

Still, it was nice to have something to look at even if she wasn’t super into the whole built-like-a-brick-house thing. He wasn’t _Jessica_ ( _don’t think about her_ ) and his blue eyes couldn’t hold a fucking flame to Rick’s but he wasn’t bad.

“It’s – this is a nice park, don’t you think? Real –” oh jeez, she already hated herself, “- real lush.” Seriously, couldn’t she just keep her mouth shut? All that wanted to come out of it was garbage - awkward, clunky garbage - and the young Urganon seemed more annoyed by her attempts at conversation that anything else.

But the park _was_ nice. Apparently plant life on Urgania favored an orange color spectrum and so the neatly manicured lawn and trimmed shrubbery and evenly spaced trees glowed a warm ochre in the midday sunlight. The landscaping design stuck Morty as a little anal – everything symmetrical and perfectly shaped and carefully spread out in concentric circles surrounding a large fountain – but it was pretty. Other-worldly. Really delivered on the whole ‘alien park’ thing.

Of course she could appreciate it more if Rick’s weapons deal or _whatever_ -the-fuck he was doing didn’t have her so on edge.

Morty hugged her own elbows and let her eyes drift over to where Rick was bickering with the older Urganon in the shade cast by an elaborate fountain that seemed to defy the laws of gravity. Streams of water tumbled over a huge slate of stone, spiraling around in physics-breaking coils until they splashed into the circular basin. And crowning the whole thing was a pearly white gem that had to be the size of Morty’s head, sparkling brightly as it caught the light reflected off the water.

Rick kept cutting his eyes back to that shiny rock every time the Urganon gestured vehemently enough to squint his three eyes closed. Which was _a lot_. Whatever they were discussing, they weren’t in agreement; that was obvious even from a distance.

Morty couldn’t hear what they were saying - she was too far away and the water burbling from the fountain hushed everything but the harshest of their tones - but she could tell Rick was frustrated from the way he swiped his hand through his hair, rolled his eyes, and pointedly cracked his neck.

It almost certainly spelled trouble but jeez, there was something about his angry predator look that really pushed her buttons and she felt an impractically timed gush of warmth threaten to drip between her legs. Angry post-adventure Rick tended to be a little rougher - wild eyes vibrantly intense - and thinking about that made her thighs clench in excitement but she vehemently shoved her arousal down, determined to keep it from getting in the way. Rick was sending her ‘ _things might go sideways_ ’ vibes out the ass so now wasn’t the time so start imagining what he might do to her if he dragged her behind one of those obnoxiously orange trees and stuck his hand down her shorts.

When they’d met up with the two Urganons originally, Rick had taken one calibrating look at the aliens and pointed Morty towards the shade of a tree thirty feet away. When the younger one had followed her, his scales glittering in the sunlight, Morty had thought he had wanted to talk - or maybe Rick and the older alien had agreed on privacy or something - but his three turquoise eyes hadn’t landed on her for more than a few seconds since his initial penetrating up-and-down stare. Unlike Rick who had glared at their retreating backs and kept cutting them progressively more frustrated looks that were putting her on edge.

“Sure is a nice day, h – huh?” Morty said lamely, and the Urganon’s thick arm was near enough to her side that she watched the muscles underneath his scales bunch when he tightened his fist. _Yeesh_.

Normally his silence wouldn’t bother Morty but she _really_ didn’t like the way the huge alien kept staring at Rick with an intensity that bordered on mania. She’d seen a lot of creatures give Rick that kind of death glare – men and women, human and alien, young and old and everywhere in between – and it usually ended in one thing: violence.

And if she were as smart as Rick, she’d know just what to say to grab the guy’s attention and turn it towards her, but she _wasn’t_ as smart as Rick and she had no clue what might capture his interest. Maybe if she hadn’t been locked in the bunker for the last month and a half - well… no, she was always awkward, _especially_ when she was around someone who qualified as _a hunk_ to such a ridiculous degree as the blue-scaled creature on her right - but at least her stutter might not have been so pronounced.

A live wire sizzled across her nerves and Morty realized Rick’s electric eyes were boring into her from across a row of neatly trimmed hedges. Morty felt the hair on the back of her neck prickle and a heat that had nothing to do with the hot sun beaded up a film of sweat across her brow.

“Is – is it always this hot here or is it, like, summer or something?” Morty asked, pulling her eyes away from Rick before she got _distracted_ in a major way, not at all surprised when the Urganon next to her stoically shifted his weight and offered no answer, a glare that could boil water twisting his face as he watched Rick cut over the older Urganon’s statement with a disdainful, barking laugh.

Morty shifted and felt the tug of her waistband against her stomach. She had a blaster tucked into the back of her denim shorts (hopefully disguised by the oversized flannel she wore over it) though she was silently pleading she wouldn’t wind up using it. She suspected Rick had been easing her back into adventuring up to this point - just a few runs out to the edge of the galaxy, an afternoon at Blips and Chitz, a robbery that turned into a rescue mission when a kidnapped Vagrian princess literally fell into their spaceship – but when he’d tossed the blaster into her scrambling grasp before opening a portal, she knew her peaceful week of readjusting was over.

“I’m not shooting anyone unless I have to, Rick,” she told him, reluctantly turning the gun over, double checking that the safety was still on.

“Unless you have to,” Rick agreed with relative ease, cutting her a wink. “Sure Mo- _ooough-_ rty.”

“You too, Rick,” she insisted, grabbing his arm when he started to roll his eyes and turn towards the portal. “L - let’s not make this a _thing_ , okay?”

“You make it sound like I _want_ to _s_ hoot people,” Rick huffed, curving his arm along her shoulders so she had to crane her neck to glace up at him with distrust.

“Don’t you?”

Her answer had been riotous, vaguely-maniacal laughter.

And there it was - she had suddenly stumbled upon an unexpected upside to the bunker: it was a lot harder to do harm when she was locked underground all day. She hadn’t missed the sight of blood or the screams of people bleeding out or the flash of memories of faces twisted in pain when she closed her eyes at night.

But even after a month and a half, the feel of her favorite blaster – the one Rick had made special just for her, the one coded to her fingerprints and his, the one that could do everything from temporarily stun a child to fire a massive laser beam that could cut through solid rock – felt _right_ in her hand in a way that kind of made her hate herself.

_Weapons_ weren’t really her thing. At least, they weren’t before she met Rick. Now the strange comfort of the barrel of her blaster pressed against her lower back argued a very different fact.

She shook herself hard out of her thoughts and realized belatedly that Rick was making his way towards her - casual and at-ease-looking with his hands in his pockets - while the young alien at her side rushed to meet up with the scowling Urganon Rick had left behind.

“Striking out, huh _Mooooorty_?” he taunted, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and tugging her into his side. “I co- _oough-_ uld hear your sad attempts at flirting even over this asshole’s plan to undercut me.” Morty and Rick watched the two aliens duck their heads together to speak with hushed voices and Rick’s eyes narrowed to dangerous slits. “And that’s really saying something cause he’s trying to rob me blind.”

“I – Rick, I wasn’t _flirting_ ,” she bit out, trying to duck under his arm but he bent his elbow and trapped her in a loose headlock. “I just - I thought it would be polite to-”

“Polite to _what,_ Morty?” Rick demanded indignantly. “I’m selling him _chemical weapons_ not trading fucking Pokémon cards.” The two aliens cut them a dark look over their double jointed shoulders and Morty felt the full brunt of six turquoise eyes brush over her from head to toe before Rick tightened his hold around her neck and shifted, turning her away from the fountain and tilting her head up until she had to squint against sunlight. “We don’t have to pretend to be friends.”

“I thought I should – I dunno – make small talk.” Rick scoffed and started rubbing his fist into the top of her head in a light noogie. Rick’s body was between her and the two aliens, his torso shielding them from view, but she could still feel a prickle of tension, that ripple of unease lifting goosebumps along her back. Something was _off._ “ _Fine_ , Rick, I didn’t like the way he was glaring at you, alright?” she admitted, feeling unnecessarily bashful over the fact. Rick didn’t need to know she was _worrying_ about him, that shit would go straight to his head. “Give me a break – you know, I’m just trying to keep you alive. Y – y - you don’t have to be such a _jerk_ about it.”

Rick’s hand stilled in her hair and the arm looped around her neck loosened enough that she could stand up straight. She tilted her head up to catch his eyes and he seemed thoughtful; almost amused. “And you think what, Morty? That your pathetic, puppy-eyed ogling is going to save the day?”

Her cheeks heated up and the corners of Rick’s mouth started to curve into a grin. “I wasn’t ‘ _ogling_ ’ either, jeez. I’ve just never seen –”

“- A six-and-a-half-foot pillar of muscles with the mind of a brain-damaged child?” Rick supplied, cutting her off and boxing her in with a hand on either shoulder. He looked sardonic but there was something hovering in the steel blue of his eyes and the deep V of his unibrow - something almost _grumpy_.

Morty tilted her head as she tried to process the strange expression. “- Someone with scales instead of skin,” she corrected him, knowing that wasn’t _entirely_ the truth but it was close enough that it probably wasn’t a lie.

But Rick could read her mind anyways. His smile turned a little mean when he responded, “Whatever you say, Morty.”

He pulled the flask from his breast pocket and took a few deep swigs, turning his glare back on the two whispering aliens.

“Is he – ” Rick had called them stupid and not like it was _her_ place to get uppity about intelligence but if they weren’t very smart, what was taking so long? “-Are they really…?”

“Du- _uuugh-_ mb as fucking rocks?” Rick supplied, finishing her question for her. “As a species, no. But these two are trying to renegotiate our agreement, Morty.” Rick’s aura was darkening and she knew too well what that usually meant. Time to start bracing herself for the worst case scenario. “They’re trying to _scam grandpa,_ _Morty,_ and that might just be their last mistake.”

The older alien, seemingly having come to some sort of agreement with his son and looking smug about it, lifted his backwards jointed arm in a wave. “Ugh, look at this joker,” Rick grumbled under his breath, “waving us over like we’re his fucking valets... Yeah yeah, we see you.” Rick waved back and made a point of draping his arm over her, tucking her against his side in a way that Morty suspected was unconscious, and shuffling his feet. “ _Fucking assholes_.”

They made their way over to the fountain _slowly_ , Rick stopping every couple feet to point out something in the landscape and plucking a red flower off a bush they passed, tugging her to a stop so he could tuck it into her hair behind her ear. The gesture was almost absent-minded and it made Morty’s heart pound, even if she knew he only did it to annoy the waiting aliens – to pay them back for waving him over so rudely - another of Rick’s little power plays.

Still, her cheeks were pink by the time they were standing opposite the aliens and meeting six flat, unimpressed turquoise eyes head on. “So, you gonna pay up or what?” Rick grunted, glancing at his watch and then the white glittering stone on the statue, his hand on her shoulder a comforting weight.

When the older alien spoke, it was with a thick accent that sounded like two Russian men were talking at the same time. “We could get the same boraxarillium from Klondike for half what you’re charging.” His young companion shifted his weight and Morty took the opportunity to take in the impressive grate of his abs. She’d never seen an eight-pack in real life and this guy had _twelve_ well defined bulges of muscles traveling up his toned stomach. She wondered if they felt as hard as they looked.

Rick’s hand tightening on her shoulder drew her attention back to the conversation. “Yeah, but then you’d have to drive your asses to fucking Klondike, wouldn’t you? The trip alone would cost you that much in fuel and then you’d have to negotiate with the – _uuurp_ \- with their president and they’ve got a real flaccid ding-dong in office these days, you know that right?” Rick pulled out his flask and twisted the cap off one-handed, taking a long sip while the two aliens silently mulled that over. “But hey, you think you can get a better deal, don’t let me stand in your way.”

Rick turned her bodily away and they hadn’t taken three steps from the fountain before the aliens hailed them back with an offer.

“Throw in the girl,” the older alien demanded in his strange, resonating voice and Morty’s stomach plummeted to the core of the planet. _What_?

Rick’s hand gripped the back of her neck like a claw and his movements were stiff and precise when he turned to the Urganons. “You’ve go- _aaughhh-_ tta be fucking – what kind of _bad cliché_ …”

“Fifty-thousand flerbos for the boraxarillium and the girl,” the alien interrupted Rick’s escalating tirade and Morty closed her eyes and pressed her fingers to her temples. Couldn’t they go _one fucking adventure_ without someone riling Rick up?

“ _Oh jeez_ …”

She could _feel_ the air around Rick turn icy-cold as the thin veneer of a normal human man slipped away and was replaced with something a thousand times more feral. “First you try to _scam_ me and now you’re trying to _buy_ my _Morty_? I can’t fucking believe this…”

“She made advances,” the older alien asserted and his son at his side nodded once. Turquoise eyes flashing over her briefly and she couldn’t stop the brief wave of shock at being appraised by someone who looked like they should be carved into marble.

But the pleasure was short lived when she felt Rick shift his maniacal glower down to her. “I _knew_ you were flirting –”

“ _I was not_!” she exclaimed, indignation rising hot and fast in her chest, meeting his glare head on and trying not to feel a little terrified by the way his pupils were expanding into massive black holes.

“We’ll throw in an extra thousand flerbos.”

Morty watched Rick’s face in profile when he turned back to the aliens and tilted his head like he might _actually_ be considering their offer. And Morty was suddenly petrified. _Would_ he give her up just to teach her a lesson about ‘flirting’? Would he portal her home and lock her back up in the bunker for being problematic? Or would be blow up the whole _planet_ just to prove a point?

Whatever he was doing, it wasn’t immediately and adamantly refusing their offer and that was more than Morty’s newly-fragile-heart could stand. “Come on, t – tell them no, Rick!”

“Fine, two-thousand,” the older alien cut over her without a single glance in her direction. “My offspring wants to lay his eggs inside of her.”

“ _Wait, what_?!” Morty spluttered, a thousand times more horrified by the proceedings. She had thought – it would be impossible not to find it a _little_ flattering if that behemoth was, like, _interested_ – but talk of egg laying popped that bubble before it even had a chance to be blown.

“It’s a whole thing, Morty, a whole ma- _aaaugh-_ ting thing.” Rick was rolling his hand in the air like that was obvious and even though everything about his body language might read casual and contemplative to someone else, Morty caught the tension in his shoulders, and the way his other hand had dropped into his lab coat pocket. “Me- _eeugh_ -ssy stuff Morty, you really don’t want to know.”

“So do we have a deal, Rick Sanchez? Fifty-two-thousand flerbos for the boraxarillium and your _Mor-tee_.” Rick’s hips shifted ever so slightly, and Morty pushed her flannel aside to brace her hands on her hips, the closest she could get to her gun without being obvious about reaching for a weapon. _Jeez_ she really hadn’t missed this; the last few seconds before shit went sideways - her heart pounding like a subwoofer, her hands going numb and shaky, the almost-stomach-ache from clenching every muscle in her body in preparation to do _whatever_ she had to do to make sure that she and Rick could stumble out of this mess alive.

“Do we have a fucking – _Morty_ ,” Rick asked, turning to her with a flat glare, “Are you go- _oough-_ nna bust my nuts if I shoot these bozos?”

But at the word ‘shoot’, the two Urganons burst into action, the massive, buff Adonis pulling a glinting black saber, seemingly from thin air, and swiping at Rick with a quick slash. “ _Rick_!”

Of course Rick was quicker, shoving her back a step so she stumbled over the lip of the fountain and landed in shallow water while the edges of a blue force field projected out of his watch like a shield and stopped the blow.

“Guess we don’t have a choice,” Rick smirked, looking to Morty like he didn’t regret where the day had taken them _at all._

“You dare threaten violence in the presence of the Peace Stone?” the younger alien finally spoke, his voice deep, the double-resonating accent even thicker than his maybe-dad’s.

“You’re the idiot swinging a sword,” Rick answered snarkily, rolling to dodge another swipe and aiming his blaster at the two aliens. “Which is just insu- _ooughh-_ ltingly archaic.” The pair dove away from his shots and the park exploded into chaos.

One of Rick’s stray blasts caught the branches of an orange tree and it erupted in sparkling green flame, spreading quickly to a nearby bush. The grass, which had looked so waxy and smooth under her feet, absorbed the fire like kindling, the green flames taking over the neatly manicured field and licking at the heels of terrified park patrons.

Morty’s frantic reach for her own pistol was halted when Rick grabbed her hard by her upper arm and dragged her along with him towards the base of the fountain, their feet sloshing through a foot and a half of water while he shot wildly towards the alien duo who had taken refuge behind one of the few trees not yet on fire. Morty slipped once, her foot loosing traction on the slick stone, and what she thought at first was Rick’s lightning quick reflex to catch her fall, turned into him wrapping his arms around her waist and hefting her up to the thick dark slab of stone capped with the glittering rock.

“Get the Peace Stone, Morty!” he demanded, and even though Morty was shaking and terrified and overwhelmed, her fingers found the wet ledge of rock and started pulling herself up, Rick’s hand on her ass shoving her higher.

“ _Jeez_ , Rick –!”

“ _Just do it_ , Morty!” he insisted, and then she was high enough to lift her knee over the ledge and Rick’s support was gone as he splashed away.

By the time she was up on the ledge, she had a spectacular view of the madness Rick’s rash actions had led to. _Everything_ was on fire, the already hot day suddenly scalding with heat. Other Urganons – unsuspecting patrons of the park – were rushing around, fleeing the scene, screaming in horror, and Morty was struck yet again by the surreality of her life.

How often did she stand beside Rick at the epicenter of destruction? How many lives had they ruined, how many tragedies could never be undone?

She scrubbed a wet hand across her face. She didn’t want to hurt anyone! Pointedly, she stilled the fingers that had been reaching for her hidden pistol. If Rick wanted to go on a murder spree, it wasn’t like she could stop him (and maybe some part of her – _some tiny little bit of her_ \- soaked up the warped sense of protectiveness he slathered over her with a fence of violent actions). But she didn’t need to add two new blue faces to the crowd of creatures who haunted her dreams with guilt.

Besides, knowing Rick, he could handle himself, right? Maybe. _Probably_.

Morty’s eye’s soaked up the fight still splashing through the fountain; the muscular alien renewed his attack, sprinting towards Rick full tilt, his black saber smoking as it repelling the barrage of laser blasts. Once he was within range, he took a quick swipe at Rick and the pistol went flying, Rick rolling away just _barely_ in time to avoid losing an arm, a tear appearing in the sleeve of his lab coat.

Rick’s smirk was dangerous as he rolled to his feet and inspected the damage to his lab coat. Morty could barely make out his taunting, “Alright, time to get archaic,” before he dug his hand into his pocket and pulled out something small enough to be hidden in his palm. Then he hit the thumb-edge of his closed fist and a massive, barbaric-looking transparent blade - longer than the alien’s sleek saber and rimmed with a glowing pink aura - grew below his palm. “I’ve been looking for an excuse to try this thing out. Look at this fucking anime sword, Morty!” he called over to her, way too excited and almost _youthful_ in his glee. “It’s like a – it’s like I’m fucking Cloud, Morty!”

And jeez, she hated him and she hated herself and she hated everything that was happening - but watching Rick crack his neck and roll his shoulders, adjusting his stance for the glowing glass sword he twirled at his side, calibrating himself to the feel of it, a wicket smile brightening his face – it lit her up like a fucking torch. Fury was _invented_ for him, he made it look so good. Morty couldn’t tear her eyes away.

Rick pounced, the feral glee twisting his face into something manic, his sharp incisors visible in the smirk that was baring his teeth. When their swords met, a blast like a bomb exploded out from the point of contact and Morty clung to the edge of the fountain, a gasp wringing out of her like a sob.

Watching Rick dodge and weave, slash and parry – it was like watching an elegant dance; no move without purpose, his body fluid with motion. She shouldn’t have been surprised; Rick mastered literally every weapon he ever held in his hand, but it had been so long since she’d seen him in action that it was like seeing it for the first time.

The upper hand - which Rick clung to with natural grace and vicious speed - was slipping away with the young Urganon’s diligence and brute force. He wasn’t landing any blows - Rick was too quick for that - but he was guiding the fight, letting Rick push him towards the ledge of the fountain, towards the burning tree they’d taken cover behind earlier, and towards the older alien who was crouched behind the lip of the fountain, a dagger held at the ready.

And suddenly Morty was furious instead of terrified, a simmering pool of hatred foaming up like soda fizz, filling every cell of her body with anger. Like that sunny morning before she took the shot to the gut - when everything shrank down to her and Rick and someone trying to _hurt_ him - it wasn’t _love_ that drew her weapon, flicked off the safety, and leveled the barrel at the young alien in one fluid motion. _It was_ _rage._

She pulled the trigger and the buck of her pistol felt too right and familiar to her hand. Unfortunately, the extended time spent in the bunker didn’t do her aim any favors and a sizzling patch of blood and viscera burst through the alien’s bicep instead of the center of his chest.

Two sets of eyes swiveled to her and the rage drained out her in a flood. “Get the rock, Morty!” Rick shouted again, using her distraction to pounce at the bigger alien’s waist and take him down in a splashing tackle, grabbing at the alien’s wrist and restraining his saber hand above his head.

Morty didn’t love the idea of turning away from the fight happening below her - of leaving Rick with a creature twice his size and rippling with muscles - but her earlier promise to do no harm made her wince in self-flagellation.

If Rick was after the stone, they wouldn’t leave until she got it and the sooner she grabbed the damn thing, the sooner they could portal away from this whole fiasco. If she was fast enough, maybe they could get out of there before anyone was killed. Maybe.

Still, she waited until Rick dropped his sword and managed to wrestle the alien’s saber out of his hand, chucking it away and holding the bigger creature in a reverse headlock below the surface of the water before she turned to the massive opal behind her. It was _bigger_ than her head and weighed at least a hundred pounds, her recently de-muscled arms straining to lift it out of the cradle of darker stone it rested in. She couldn’t pick it up, it was too heavy, but by bracing her shoulder against it and scrabbling against the slick stone at her feet, she was able to roll it to the ledge of the fountain.

“It’s too fucking heavy, Rick!” she shouted down to where Rick was struggling to keep the alien pinned underwater, a foamy spray surrounding him as the Urganon kicked and thrashed against Rick’s solid hold. And she knew those arms too well - their hold was stronger than steel when he wanted them to be. A sapphire blue hand scrabbled at Rick’s chest and neck but Rick tilted his head back, avoiding the grasping fingers as his face set in a hard expression. She almost pitied the giant drowning alien, but then she noticed the red stain blooming where Rick’s sleeve had been cut and her sympathy evaporated.

“Be right there, Morty,” Rick called, his voice straining when he almost got bucked off. But he shifted his weight and jabbed at the trashing body with his knee until the struggling died down.

Then a furious shout cut over the snapping sounds of flames and the screams getting caught in the wind as the older Urganon rushed Rick, a sinister looking dagger glinting with the reflected light of the world on fire.

The alien had a hole in his head before Morty even realized she had raised her pistol. He staggered forwards another two steps, arms going limp at his side, torso losing momentum, legs crumbling underneath him like a toy running out of battery before he dropped face first into the shallow water at Rick’s side. It was grotesque and she’d be dreaming about that later, no doubt, but Rick was still alive and that distinctly felt like the only thing that mattered, even if he was still struggling with the behemoth underwater.

“Rick!” she shouted and as soon as his wild, electric eyes found hers, she hucked her still warm pistol in an overhand throw.

It was poetry watching him stretch out an arm and catch it midair, spin it around by the trigger ring one-handedly, rise off his knees, level the blaster and fire once into the water.

The thrashing stilled immediately and Morty was torn between feeling sick and feeling relieved. A whole new wave of nausea swept over her when relief properly won out and she sank down to a squat beside the glittering white stone.

She fucking _knew_ they were in for trouble today. And she was such a fucking screw up. If she hadn’t tried to make conversation with the alien that was now a corpse at Rick’s feet, maybe he’d still be alive. Maybe his dad would still be alive. Maybe the beautiful, regimented park wouldn’t be smoldering in flames.

But now she had two new faces to add to the internal archive of people she’d killed.

It was hard to breathe, the air thick with smoke and ashes, and Morty realized she was gasping right about the same time the sound of sirens managed to filter past her panic.

Rick slicked a hand through his hair and tilted his neck on his shoulders. He turned to the other place where the water was stained a dark blue, fishing around beneath the surface for a moment before wading towards her.

“You okay there, bud?” he asked, the angle of looking down at him from above foreign. When she didn’t immediately answer, he grabbed onto the ledge and hauled himself up with an ease that made no sense for someone who had just single-handedly fought and killed an Urganon tank – not to mention Rick’s age - squatting in front of her and bracing a hand on her shoulder. “You really had my back there, Morty. Really helped me out of that one.” He reached into his pocket and handed her back her blaster, still warm from the shot that killed the young Urganon.

“I – I did?” she asked, hating the tremble in her voice, but it was so rare for Rick to acknowledge her with anything that close to praise. She reached out a shaking hand to take her weapon back, automatically tucking it into the back of her waistband and feeling the warmth of it travel up her spine like poison. “I – I got the stone, Rick. It’s too heavy to pick up though.”

“You did a real good job today, Morty.” His voice was uncharacteristically warm and she closed her eyes to better savor the sound. His wet hand found her hair and ruffled it and even though she had just shot a man, she couldn’t help the ripple of self-satisfaction that made something hot bloom in her stomach. It was so long since she’d been _useful_ , since she’d done something to _help_. Everything else in her life she was a complete failure at, _but not this_ – not being Rick’s sidekick. She didn’t always get it right either but he could count on her to watch his back. As long as she was alive, she wasn’t going to let _anything_ get to him. That was what she was made for.

“Alright, how about we get out of here?” His voice was still soft like he was worried she was about to break and Morty, determined to prove herself, ran her forearm across her runny nose and did her best to tune out the voices in her head calling her a murderer. Rick shot a portal, scooped the stone up easily with one arm – _how the fuck_ – and offered her his empty palm. She took it, letting him haul her to her feet and lace their fingers together before they stepped off the stone platform and dropped through the swirl of green.

They landed hard on metal flooring with an ominous _clang_ and when she glanced around and realized they’d portaled to the bunker, Morty felt an instinctual wave of terror so intense she almost missed the most obvious point of interest in the room.

The dim fluorescent lighting was reflecting off another figure, eyes gleaming cat-like in the dark, white form and pale blue hair almost ghostly in the gloom. Then Morty’s brain turned over and pieced together what she was seeing -finally made sense of the nightmare –put words to the observation that defied logic.

There was another Rick standing at the opposite end of the room, blinking wide, electric-blue eyes at them that practically glowed amongst the sea of blinking lights and swirling jars.

Another Rick - _another Rick was in the bunker._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wuh oh...


	12. Chapter Twelve

Morty’s blaster was in her hand and leveled at the other-Rick before she made the conscious decision to reach for her weapon.

“Woah woah woah!” Rick – _her-Rick_ – shouted, landing his bigger palm over the barrel of her pistol and pressing the weapon down but _that made no sense_. Why would he be stopping her from shooting another Rick when he’d given her _explicit_ instructions to kill any Rick who laid eyes on her after the whole Citadel fiasco? And no fucking way was she going to sit passive through another round of _that_.

“Rick, who the fuck is this guy?!” Morty demanded, trying to resist his insistent pushing at her pistol, keeping it trained on the stranger, memories of other Ricks – of hard-faced grandpas in white military uniforms manhandling her into a car, passing her back and forth and groping her over her clothes, _laughing_ while Rick’s bloodied body haunted her from where they’d stashed him in the trunk – flashing like lightening behind her eyes, setting off an instant migraine that blurred everything but the carefully neutral face of the other-Rick still staring at her wide-eyed like a goldfish.

The other-Rick slowly raised his hands, brow quirking slightly sardonically even as he shifted his weight in a move Morty knew so well it almost gave her vertigo because normally she was seeing it from behind – Rick’s little casual side-step to shield her, to bodily give her cover, a move he’d _never_ cop to that made her heart bloom with sugar-sticky hope - and with a sick jolt that nearly floored her, she realized _the other-Rick wasn’t alone_.

A Morty peered out from around his shoulder. Not a _boy-_ Morty like she usually saw (from a great distance) when they ran into another pair of Rick and Morties out in the wild. A _girl-_ Morty. One that looked _exactly like her_ , down to the high-waisted jean shorts, crop top, and oversized yellow flannel.

“ _What_ the _fuuuuuck_ …”

“Okay, Morty, try not to freak out –” She cut a glare so hard at her-Rick that she half-hoped it would set him on fire but it only made two identical grins turn up the corners of both Rick’s mouths.

“Rick, what –” a wavering voice - some weird imitation of _Morty’s_ voice - cut in from behind the other-Rick’s back, “- do you think we should do something?” the other-Morty asked and the way other-Rick elbowed her until she slotted back behind him and rolled his eyes dramatically towards the ceiling was just un- _fucking-_ canny. “Maybe we should – I dunno – introduce ourselves?”

Morty’s arm went limp and she let Rick push her weapon down to her side, the floor suddenly looking much farther away than normal when she started wondering if she might collapse.

“A- _auuught_ -lright, back in the cabinet. You’ve already fu- _uuugh-_ cked me over enough for today,” her-Rick burped, dropping the giant white stone onto his worktable with a noisy _thud_ , pulling his flask from his pocket, and running a hand over his face with a sigh. Morty turned to him - confused and convinced the order was for her even though it didn’t make any sense - until the other-Rick slid his hand along the blank wall and what she thought was solid metal folded out to reveal a hidden compartment.

“Don’t bla- _aaaugh-_ me _me_ , dill-weed. You’re the one who fucked this up,” the other-Rick snarked, sidestepping the swinging cabinet door and pushing other-Morty out of the way with a hand on her shoulder.

In the hidden space behind the wall were three empty slots barely bigger than her locker at school and two that were already occupied by… _oh jeez_ … _by mom and Summer_. Limp and seemingly sleeping standing up, Morty nearly tripped in her urgency to stagger closer but Rick caught her by the bicep and held her back.

“Easy there, Morty,” he soothed, and Morty was sure she’d completely lost it when other-Rick helped other-Morty into one of the compartments, fiddled with a thick cable protruding from the back wall, and swept her hair away from the back of her neck. With an audible _snick_ , he plugged the wires _into the back of her head_ and her eyes slotted closed, her body going limp against the side of the locker like she was puppet and her strings had been cut.

_What the_ actual _fuck._

She didn’t realize her mouth was wide open until other-Rick shot her one more glance over his shoulder. “Good luck explaining this one,” he directed at her-Rick, a chuckle making his voice rumble in a painfully familiar way. He stepped backwards into the compartment next to the other-Morty and reached blindly for his own cord. “Worst case scenario you can always do a little –” he made a scissor motion by his forehead, clicking his tongue, and her-Rick sighed beside her. “I mean, I know you won’t. _I_ wouldn’t. But you _could._ ”

Then he plugged himself in and went slack against the back wall of his compartment.

“ _Rick_ –” Morty breathed, the name faint on her lips. She wanted to get a closer look at the line of slumped-over doppelgangers but the idea of stepping any closer to them raised goosebumps over every inch of her skin. “What the _hell,_ Rick…”

“They’re robots, Morty,” Rick answered flatly, tilting his flask back again until it was vertical, shaking the last few drops into his mouth and frowning as he screwed the lid back on. “Robot us-es. I made them.”

“Okay…” That was _weird_. Weird but not unimaginable considering the long list of strange things she’d seen Rick build. But… “ _Why_?”

“They’re useful, Morty. Good to have around. You never know when you’ll need a spare Summer to run errands around town or an extra Beth to sign off on a parent-teacher conference.”

She finally screwed up enough courage to step closer to the line of seemingly-sleeping robots, but she still gave the robot version of her sister a three foot radius while she examined the pink-tipped hair and the thin scar on her chin from when the _real_ Summer slammed her head against the driveway during her brief-lived and disastrous scooter phase at age thirteen.

It was… disconcerting. She ( _it_?) looked _exactly_ like Summer. The robotic creatures her and Rick usually came across on adventures were much more mechanical looking - like Gearhead; they tended not to waste their time with synthetic skin or hair. And the ones that did were a little _off_ \- too plastic-y to pass for the real thing.

Morty half lifted her hand but couldn’t quite bring herself to touch the two side-by-side freckles on her robot-sister’s bare arm, the ones she knew by heart from a lifetime of sitting next to her on the couch and in the backseat of the car.

With a firm mental shake, Morty paced along, noting the very fine lines around the mom-robot’s closed eyes and the familiar wine stain on the hem of mom’s favorite red shirt. But even an artificial, sleeping version of her mother was hard to look at for too long (that thick pool of guilt welling up like it always did) and she quickly passed over her, stopping in front of the one wearing Morty’s face.

“W - what about the us-es?” Morty stammered, her voice catching in her throat. She heard Rick’s heavy steps approaching, the slide of a drawer, and the _tink_ of glass against glass. When he padded into her periphery, he was tilting back a bottle of whiskey.

“They d- _ooough-_ o the shit we wouldn’t want to waste our ti- _eeugh-_ me with, Morty.” She scrunched up her eyebrows in confusion and Rick sighed before continuing, “They cover for us when adventuring keeps us away longer than Beth would find acceptable. Morty-bot does your chores and goes to school for you when you ditch. Rick-bot handles some of my side-hustles. They eat dinner with Beth when we won’t make it home on time.” He paused to take a long sip and brace a fist on his hip, slanting her flat, _purposely_ emotionless eyes. “They make our lives _easier_ , Morty.”

It was then Morty realized she’d almost run straight into Morty-bot _that very morning_ when she’d been careening down the hall at school. The glimpse of brown and yellow turning the corner that had raised the hairs on the back of her neck. It was _her_. _Morty-bot_. They must have nearly sprinted right past each other.

_That_ explained why Mr. Goldenfold didn’t ream her out for being late even though it was one of his favorite things to do. Morty-bot had been on time. She’d been sitting in class - sitting in _Morty’s_ seat - filling out the worksheet and _signing Morty’s name at the top of it._ And when the _real_ Morty stepped in and unknowingly traded places with the doppelganger, _no one noticed._

_Oh jeez._

“Wait… is this –” a thought just occurred to Morty, an insidious thought, one that released a spike of adrenaline straight into Morty’s heart, and since she couldn’t reach into her own chest and steady the frantic beating, her hand found the pendant dangling from her neck and latched on. “Was this thing – did _she_ take my place while I was _down here._ ”

Her head turned but she felt like she was a thousand miles away, watching Rick’s carefully neutral face like he was an actor in a movie on a screen in a big dark room.

He blinked. He burped. He carefully shuttered _something_ behind the blacks of his pupils and then he answered, “O- _ooouugh-_ bviously.”

Morty staggered back a step and she could feel how ice-cold Rick’s hand was where he steadied her - palm against the base of her spine - through two layers of clothes. She fought the impractical urge to slap him away.

Did that revelation make her feel better or worse? On the one hand, it finally gave a solid explanation for the blasé way Summer and mom had reacted to her absence which soothed over the slowly deepening pit of worry that they hadn’t _cared_ that she’d been gone. That maybe they’d been happier without her around. That maybe now they were shooting her looks when her back was turned, thinking ‘ _things sure were better when Morty wasn’t around_.’

On the other hand…

“So – while I was locked up down here, you were running around with a – a robot version of me?!”

Now _that_ thought stung. Mom and Summer going about their lives without ever noticing Morty was replaced by a robot was _exactly_ what she’d expect of the both of them. But _Rick_? He – he was supposed to be different…

“Not _exactly_ ,” he answered cryptically, rubbing his hand in a little circle against her lower back and taking an extended gulp of whatever cheap whiskey was making the whole room smell like antiseptic and wood. And she _hated_ that he wouldn’t just tell her whatever he was so obviously keeping locked up behind his teeth, her brain overheating trying to parse out what could be so bad that _Rick_ \- the most insensitive bastard in the entire universe - would deem too unsettling to share.

“Oh jeez,” Morty realized, putting the picture together in her head. In her mind’s eye, she saw robot-Morty – battle worn but unstoppable, half her face peeling away to reveal servos and wires underneath, a massive gun that _she_ didn’t struggle to hold up with her robot arms, Rick safe behind her, shielded by her impenetrable metal body. “She’s a _robot_. She’s – she’s probably _incredible_ ,” Morty whispered in despair. Robot-Morty probably didn’t flinch at the sound of gunfire. Robot-Morty probably never nagged Rick to be less-murder-y. Robot-Morty was probably _exactly_ the kind of Morty Rick always wanted because _wouldn’t he design her to be_?!

Was Morty drowning? No? She was surrounded by air but she couldn’t seem to get enough into her constricting lungs. “She’s gotta be _way_ better at stuff than I am,” her mouth shaped without her head’s permission and she sounded whiny even over the pounding of blood in her ears.

“No – _Morty_ , you’re missing the whole point,” Rick growled, turning her to face him, crouching down on one knee in front of her, and boxing her in with a hand on each shoulder. “She’s _exactly_ as good at ‘ _stuff_ ’ as you are. If she was some competent badass –” _jeez he_ could _read her mind_ “- that would defeat her whole purpose. I designed her - designed _all of them -_ to be perfect replicas. So she trips over her own feet and farts in her sleep, just like you do, Morty.”

Rick was boring down at her with a serious look, and she didn’t _like_ it, but she already believed him. After all, it wasn’t often he lied to her. If robot-Morty _was_ a lot better than her, he’d be the first one to tell her – he’d do it _gleefully_ , even; or maybe he would have simply disappeared with her ages ago – so if he made the effort and put down his half-drank bottle of whiskey just to calm her down, he was probably being sincere. _Maybe_.

Then the last bit of his diatribe hit her like a pipe over the head.

“Do you – have you _slept_ with her?” And she didn’t mean to sound so indignant. It wasn’t like the two of them were _exclusive_. But finding out that he had fucked a robot replica of her would be… _hard to bear_.

 But Rick breathed out a noise that was almost a chuckle and looked entirely too pleased when he said, “Jeezus, Morty, really?” around a grin.

“Oh god, that’s a yes…”

“ _No_ , you fucking dra- _auugh-_ ma queen,” he out-right laughed and she tried not to sigh in relief but the urge was too overwhelming. She tilted her head back and stared blankly through the dark ceiling, willing the tears that beaded up in her eyes to be reabsorbed.

When she was sure none of them would slide down her checks, she lowered her head and leveled him with the most disbelieving look she could muster, leaning into his hand when he brushed his fingers over her single raised eyebrow, probably trying to smooth it out.

“That’s not what she’s for, _jeezus_ Morty.” And he sounded sincere if also absurdly amused. But his eyes were warm, like he found her fit of jealousy endearing, like he wanted to pour syrup over her and eat her for breakfast. But she wasn’t quite ready to lay it to rest.

“But you _could_ ,” she said, feeling her lips turn down in a pout and the sting of more tears threaten the back of her throat.

“Except I _wouldn’t_.” His words were firm and flat as he rose to his feet, towering over her. He reached for the bottle of liquor and took another long gulp. “Do- _ooough-_ n’t get me wrong, Morty, I’ve fucked and been fucked by _many_ a robot, but it’s pretty damn pathetic to settle for the replica when I’ve got the real-deal walking around. Right?”

His palm caught up her cheek and it was such a gentle touch, such a _careful_ caress, that Morty leaned into it and let herself believe, if only for just this moment, that he _meant_ it. She breathed out a long sigh, feeling her heartrate finally slow to something normal and muttered, “Right,” after a lengthy pause.

Her eyes drifted past her-Rick to the robot replica of him leaning against the back of his locker. Looking at robot-Morty made her feel dizzy and a little nauseous but looking at Rick’s was grounding. She knew his face and his body better than she knew her own. Even turned off, robot-Rick looked for all the world like Rick had fallen asleep standing up. And considering some of the positions he managed when he drunkenly passed out, it wasn’t as absurd a sight as it should have been.

Her-Rick backed up automatically when she took the three unsteady steps it took to come close enough to robot-Rick to reach out a trembling hand and touch the slack hand hanging at his side. Its trigger-finger was calloused in exactly the same place as the one on her-Rick’s finger, the skin rough and hard where he’d spent a lifetime notching his digit through a gun.

She gently flipped his hand over, the dead-weight of it strange but not foreign when she was so used to Rick drunk and unconscious. It was the same palm she had pressed her hand to that first night out of the bunker. The faint tinge of blue tracing the pronounced veins on the back of his hand. The knobbly knuckles marred by scars. The same difference in size when she smoothed her palm over his.

With a glance over her shoulder to shrug at her-Rick’s pointed staring, she leaned up on her toes to get a better look at robot-Rick’s face. With his eyes closed, the two of them were identical. His lab coat even smelled like the electric/solder/vodka smell Rick carried around like a cloud, but none of Rick’s natural musk softened the harsh smell of chemicals.

Feeling brave and deathly curious, she looped a finger in the waistband of his pants and pulled them away from his skin, peering down into the darkness of his khakis until she could properly make out the shape of his very familiar dick.

Her-Rick dissolved into laugher at that, breaking into those heartbreakingly honest, belly-deep guffaws she so rarely heard and so covetously treasured. “ _Oh Morty_ , always a fucking surprise…” he gasped out around his laughter and she loved the way her name sounded warped by his happiness.

She eased robot-Rick’s pants back into position, smoothing the wrinkles in his sweater and tried not to smile in a reflexive response to Rick’s joy. Okay, so the replica was fully equipped. For some reason, she _really_ needed to know that. And then she realized why.

“Oh jeez, Rick, have _I_? With _him_?”

She liked to think she would have known if it wasn’t her-Rick buried inside of her, but from where she was standing, it was hard to stay so sure she’d spot the difference.

“ _No_ , Morty,” Rick reassured her quickly, one of his cold hands brushing over her hair to land at the nape of her neck. “Yo- _ooough-_ u’ve never even talked to him. You saw him _once_ through a window; he was selling weed to one of your classmates. You waved, he waved, and then he portaled home. That was the most contact you’ve ever had until now.”

Morty couldn’t even remember the specific occasion for how frequently Rick popped up throughout her day, even if she was at school or elsewhere in town. Catching a glimpse of him out of the corner of her eyes, shooting him a shy little wave and a smile, and then watching him disappear through a portal was hardly uncommon.

Against her will, still standing close to the eerily still replica of Rick, she swiped a quick searching glance over robot-Morty. Looking at her was a little less jarring now that she knew what was going on but it was still weird.

On the Palisade, the other Morties were so obviously _not_ her, even at just a glance. They dressed differently and took better care of their hair and walked with more confidence and didn’t look so wide-eyed and shell-shocked as Morty perpetually felt that it was _obvious_ they were different people entirely. People she kind of suspected Rick wouldn’t have the patience for (or at least that’s what she vehemently told herself every time she let her thoughts dwell too long in the darkest places they could find). But the robot-her was supposed to _be_ her.

She didn’t really want to ask - she didn’t want to _know_ \- but somehow she couldn’t swallow the thought down fast enough.

“D - do you take her out on adventures a lot?”

Morty might have been able to forgive him if he slept with the robot-Morty – she’d be lying if she said she wasn’t slightly curious about the difference between her-Rick and robot-Rick - but taking robot-Morty out on adventures… that would be a line they could never uncross, a wound that would never close, the one thing she had where she thought she might be (relatively, almost, despite all the other Morties out in the multiverse) irreplaceable. Her fingers found the topaz at her wrist and nearly squeezed.

“ _She_ can’t block my brainwaves so it’d be _stupid_ to take her out on adventures,” Rick snapped and the ire in his voice was oddly comforting. “Je- _eeugh-_ ez Morty, needy much?”

Morty sighed out a long breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding, retreating back to Rick’s side and nudging at him with her shoulder until he relented and wrapped his arms around her in a hug.

She didn’t _love_ the whole robot thing. But she could live with it. They were probably even a good idea, in a lot of ways. Morty wasn’t a huge fan of the idea of being held back for all the days of school she missed and with another Morty to make up the difference, the threat of being a high school drop-out significantly decreased – especially if that Morty had secret unlimited access to the internet while she took Morty’s tests.

Despite the comfort of Rick’s casual embrace and her slowing heartrate as she sank into his half-assed attempt at comfort, Morty’s eyes wandered back to the last empty cabinet - to the last loose cord dangling unconnected in the back of a dark locker. Something about it felt ominous, like stumbling upon a buried memory of a nightmare, the remembered fear real and intense even though the images stayed foggy.

“There’s an empty compartment,” Morty said, her voice sounding distant even in her own head.

Rick shifted, pulling one arm off of her long enough to take two audible gulps of pungent whiskey.

“Y- _uuuugh_ -up.”

What was she missing? Rick didn’t seem likely to offer up the answer and though that was hardly out of character, she could feel the way the arm around her back had tensed.

Her eyes scanned back over the lockers. One slot was for Rick. One was for Morty. One was mom’s and the other’s Summer’s. That left…

“ _Where’s dad’s_?” she breathed, before she even realized she’d put it all together, the thought obvious now she’d said it out loud. “Wait – Rick, if you had a robot him, why didn’t you replace him when –” …nope, she still couldn’t finish that thought. “- If no one would notice the difference, wouldn’t that be easier than -” ‘ _maybe probably killing him_? _Nope_ , couldn’t say that either. “ _Rick_?” she finally settled on, pleading with him to understand her unasked question, the frantic thought that was making her skin clammy with sweat.

Rick was scowling at her – no, not _at_ her, _through_ her – like he was looking into the past and it left a bad taste in his mouth. His arm tightened around her shoulders, pressing her face against his sternum and reducing her view to knit teal sweater while his heart thumped out a steady beat below her ear.

And like a shock from that hated collar, some half-remembered thing tried to surface, some memory from her time in the bunker sizzled to the forefront of her mind. A dream. A _nightmare_. Her dad unfolding from a cabinet – _that_ cabinet – and slinking towards her like a hungry snake, whispering awful things in the dark…

“ _…daddy gets to play when you’re in dreamland…_ ”

Was that – had that been _real_? Not a _dream_ but a _memory_?

“Jerry-bot ou- _uuugh-_ tlived its usefulness.” Rick’s voice was deep and resonating, the rasp of it grounding where she pressed her ear to his chest. “It was too much like the real thing – weasel-y, self-motivated, unwilling to listen to orders. It started getting ideas, Morty. _Bad_ ideas.” Morty remembered the way dad had tugged off his shirt, how he’d unsnapped the button of his jeans, how he’d _leered at her_ … “He was a bad fit in the family, Morty. Just like your dad. It was – _urrrrp_ \- safer to get rid of them both.”

Sparks and an electric gaze and the crunch of metal against metal flashed behind Morty’s closed eyes and she retreated fast from the half formed memory before it could solidify enough to haunt her. Because if robot-dad had been programed to be like real-dad… If he acted and thought like her dad…

_No_.

Rick’s arms pressed against her back, sandwiching her against his chest tighter - tight like the hug he’d pulled her into when he’d yanked her out of all that goop that nearly drowned her. Tight like the way he’d held her up when he’d stormed into that rich-Rick’s horror-mansion when she was sure he was dead and gone forever. Tight like the way he’d cradled her after she’d woken up in that alien hospital, the fresh-pink skin of her stomach still tender when he pulled her into him and buried his head against her neck, his two-day stubble rough against the skin of her throat.

Acid rose in the back of Morty’s throat, stinging and noxious and determined. ‘ _Just forget about it_ ,’ she begged herself, but thoughts kept on forming, taking shape, making monsters out of memories.

Because Rick had always _hated_ dad. And while Rick hated a lot of people he always had a special well of contempt for dad, a seemingly endless pool to dip his fingers in and drink from, wetting the endless sarcasm and insults and pointed exclusions.

Morty had always assumed it had something to do with his original Beth and the way she’d been abandoned while she was pregnant by her Jerry. That Rick had formed a grudge that transcended dimensions and dad was an easy target for an endless barrage of pent up aggression, especially since it wasn’t like dad was smart or practical or self-sufficient (…not that _Morty_ was either – a comparison that sometimes terrified her when she spent too long thinking about Rick and the inevitability of him losing patience with her). And besides all that, dad was _annoying_ and Rick wasn’t known for his tolerance.

But still, was that enough? Enough for him to put mom and Summer and Morty through the hassle of _removing him from their lives_? Could Rick hate dad _that much_?

Morty rubbed her face against the rough knit of his sweater and swallowed.

Those Urganon aliens who had wanted to lay eggs inside her or whatever – Rick didn’t have to _kill_ them either, but he did. The alien who’d shot her in the stomach – she’d found out much later, completely by accident - that once she was stable and on the way the way to recovery, he’d portaled back to their planet and left them a neutrino bomb big enough to create a new black hole. That other-Rick, the first other-Rick she’d ever seen, the one who showed up in the garage the night everything changed – Rick had come back to her bedroom covered in his blood.

If she was reading between the lines right, Rick reserved a special kind of malice for the people who hurt _her_. And there was no one he hated more than dad. Did that mean…?

She had to change the subject. _Fast_. Because it was best to leave that thought there where it couldn’t keep her up at night.

“So they - these things just _live_ down here -”

“- they aren’t exactly _alive_ , Morty -”

She kept talking over his interruption, her heart pounding fast in her chest, “- and – and take our place every once in a while?” She turned her face up to Rick and he tilted his head like he was trying to make sense of something. But her question had been sincere so she waited him out, just like she always did when he got that vaguely distrustful look on his face like he was working out what she was trying to pull over him.

Eventually, after a long silence she quietly waited out, his unibrow flattened, the shadows leaving his face as he answered, “At school. At dinner. Your sister’s graduation ceremony, that time Beth wanted to go to an art fair, the weekend we got stuck in the Horsehead Nebula with no fuel -”

“- and no one can tell the difference?”

Rick shrugged. “N- _ooough-_ o complaints yet.”

“And you _made_ them?”

That was… it should have been impossible. But Rick specialized in the impossible. She was still a little pissed he’d kept them from her - that he’d built a whole family of robots right under her nose and never told her about them - but she was pretty sure her face reflected the overwhelming sense of awe she felt more than the slight annoyance.

Rick quirked his brow at her and the smile that lifted the corners of his mouth was smug like he knew exactly what she’d just been thinking. “Built them. Programed them. Keep them up to date.” He pressed a quick kiss to her temple and Morty tried not to melt under the small display of joyful affection. “Child’s play, Morty. Maybe not for anyone else but I’m not ‘anyone else’, am I?”

And what the fuck was wrong with her that cocky-Rick was such a turn on?

“Rick that’s – I mean that’s fucked up.” He laughed and she couldn’t help the amazed chuckle that burbled out of her in disbelief. “But it’s also – it’s kind of amazing, Rick.”

‘ _You’re_ kind of amazing, Rick,’ she didn’t dare voice, certain that would over-inflate his already too massive ego. _Terrifying_ but amazing. Rick’s fucking byline.

The smirk he cut her went straight to her stomach where it watered the deep roots already twisting her guts.

He lifted his bottle in a little toasting salute and bent to press another easy smile to her hair.

“Genius and a god, baby.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good news: I've pretty much filled in the gap from when I moved things around in the story so you can expect more reliable chapter updates from now on!
> 
> Bad news: Turns out I am a massive perv and things are gonna _get weird_. But if you've made it this far, maybe you won't think it's bad news after all.
> 
> Anyways, thanks for reading and see you all in hell. ¯\\_(◕ᴗ◕✿)_/¯


	13. Chapter Thirteen

Against all odds, Summer stopped in long enough to eat dinner that night – she had even picked up take-out from a famous curry restaurant on Io – and for the first time since before the bunker, things felt almost _normal_ again.

Sure, it turned out Rick had built a secret robot family in his bunker and occasionally swapped them out in like substitute players on basketball team but Summer and Rick were laughing and trading friendly barbs. Mom pushed aside her tablet for long enough to smile once (at Rick, of course, but Morty still counted it), and Morty didn’t sweat through her flannel until she cleared the plates away and Rick (followed closely by mom and then Summer) trailed after her into the kitchen.

So it wasn’t a _big deal_.

While Morty loaded the dishwasher, Summer dug out three kitschy little shot glasses she’d found in the back of the cupboard and doled out tequila from a bottle she pulled out of her purse like she _wasn’t_ underage but neither mom nor Rick drew attention to that, accepting the proffered shots and clinking their glasses together.

And Morty only felt _a little_ left out even though she would have turned down the shot if they’d offered her one (but they _didn’t_ offer her one anyways).

She’d only ever been drunk once and it was on accident; when she and Rick crashed a swanky party on Gorgablorg for no _real_ reason besides the hell of it - or at least they weren’t stealing something or selling something or trying to overthrow someone’s government. At the time, she was thoroughly preoccupied by how good Rick looked in a suit and how _pretty_ the dress was that he’d procured for her out of fucking nowhere that she didn’t realize getting her drunk had probably been a part of some weird scheme Rick had cooked up because he was bored.

In retrospect she should have known the thin flutes of burning red liquid were alcoholic by the way Rick was pounding them back but he distracted her from that logical conclusion by exhaling fire after every sip and of course she wanted to try it out for herself. And then Rick started teaching her tricks (like how curling her tongue while she breathed out resulted in burning rings that floated to the ceiling and evaporated in puffs of smoke) and he kept handing her flutes and the last thing she remembered was tumbling all over Rick and giggling like mad while he broke them into a way-too-nice hotel room, his hands tearing apart her way-too-nice dress at the seams.

The next morning she had bitched at him for getting her drunk (she was hyper-aware of the cycle of abuse, of genetic predisposition, of how easily drinking could turn into _exactly_ the kind of escape she sometimes sought out in the middle of the night when Rick was up late working on something and Morty felt so so _so_ alone) and he’d rolled his eyes but hadn’t forced the issue even if she could tell from the calculating look in his eyes that the topic would eventually be revisited.

But with the way things were, she had a feeling Rick dropped it so quickly because she had gotten talkative and affectionate that night – wearing that gorgeous dress and too enraptured by Rick in a suit. Talkative and affectionate and _not at all discrete about their relationship_ – kissing him and hanging on his arm and once even very publicly grabbing his thin ass (and making a ‘ _honk honk_ ’ sound – jeez, she’d never live it down) - which was _fine_ for Gorgablorg but was decided less so for their kitchen while mom and Summer crowded in together at the breakfast bar.

Still, Rick’s reptile eyes drifted to her when they all raised their tiny glasses in a toast and drank the gold liquor in one swallow, everyone but Rick hissing at the burn.

Morty watched the activities from the corner of her eye, feeling wrong-footed and on edge – but that was how she almost _always_ felt around mom and Summer since she’d come out of the bunker and it was hard to tell when it was baseless anxiety setting her off or when it was some animal extinct trying to warn her off a danger she hadn’t fully parsed out for herself yet.

Mom - who had four glasses of wine before Summer suggested taking shots - was already drunk enough that she was rambling a long, steady stream of facts about all the different shapes and sizes of hearts (or heart-equivalent organs) across the galaxy when she interrupted herself with a more coherent thought. “Ooh, Dad – I’ve got a day off tomorrow and I was thinking; maybe we could go check out some of those schools on my list? You know -” she broke off to dissolve into a fit of shell-shocked laughter, “- the ones in _space_?”

And even if Morty knew (too well) that mom’s good humor was a result of the wine and tequila, it had been so long since Morty had heard her mother’s laugh she had nearly forgotten the sound of it.

Rick - who was in the middle of refilling everyone’s shot glasses - paused to take a swig straight from the bottle (“ _Hey, use the glass_ ,” Summer groused), and there was something about the set of his shoulders that sucked the joy right out of Morty.

“I wasss thinking we’d make a day of it,” mom continued, sounding hopeful and young and _drunk_ , a combination that had Morty hurrying to finish rinsing the plates while she spared one quick glance at her family gathered around the kitchen island.

Mom was gazing at Rick with that starry-eyed look she sometimes got when she was feeling sentimental and Morty fisted all the silverware together, shoving them under the water, less thorough than usual in her haste to get out of the kitchen. Morty’s gaze darted to Summer, who had steadfastly turned her attention to her phone - that carefully blank, checked-out expression guarding her thoughts – and Morty knew she wasn’t the only one bracing herself for a potential ordeal.

Before Rick showed up, when mom got needy, it usually meant she’d be a little kinder to dad for an evening – would let him drape his arm over her shoulder while they watched TV, might even go up to bed together, giggling with their hands clasped - while Summer and Morty would get a brief break from being bombarded with glares that said too clearly ‘ _I should never have had kids_ ’.

But unlike dad - who knew it was only those brief good moods that kept their marriage together and lovingly returned the attention - Rick _hated_ sentimentality and the pressure mom was laying on him was _thick_ with trouble.

“O- _ooough-_ kay, we’ll take the ship,” Rick answered, holding out a shot to Summer with his little finger raised away from the glass. And Morty was so surprised she almost dropped the cup she’d been holding under the faucet.  A rush of relief pulsed through her and something a little like pride that Rick had handled himself so well made her chest swell with affection. Then he said, “Morty’s never seen Kepler-296f - or what’s known to the locals as _Super Earth_ – so it could be fun.”

Morty deflated and started loading up cups two at a time in her hurry to get out of the blast zone.

She tried to tell herself it was just that everyone paused to take a shot – it wasn’t like the silence was _icy_ or _fragile_ or anything like that. She kept her eyes pinned on the dishwasher as she bent over to pour soap into the machine, feeling Rick’s eyes on the back of her head – feeling _mom’s_ eyes on the back of her head – and very much wishing she could open up the window over the sink and jump out of it.

She had to brace herself after she closed the dishwasher door and turned the dial, the loud groaning thud of it turning on breaking the weird quiet that had settled over the room. Rick was watching her with neutral eyes, something too sincere around the corners of his mouth when he smiled faintly and promised, “You’ll love it, bud. There’s dogs, Morty – do- _ooough-_ gs the size of horses, Morty. People ride them around and it’s –” he broke off to laugh and that bubble of joy that always expanded when Rick was having a good time turned to crystal and shattered when Morty caught sight of her mother’s flat glare over Rick’s shoulder. “- it’s fucking hilarious, Morty, peo- _ooough-_ ple riding around on fucking wiener dogs and – and pugs and shit. I can’t believe I’ve never taken you there. Start - _uuurp_ – start thinking about what kind of dog you want to ride, Morty, they’ve got ‘em all…”

“Morty has summer school, dad,” mom interrupted and just the tone of her voice made Morty wish she could sink through the floor even if it meant she’d wind up back in the bunker. That would honestly be preferable to the sheer hatred her mother was cutting her across the kitchen like Morty was responsible for every bad moment of her life.

And jeez - maybe Morty was.

Rick scoffed and poured himself and Summer another shot, pounding it back and wiping his chin off on the back of his fist. “School’s a waste of her ti- _eeeugh_ -me, sweetie.”

“Education is _important_ , Dad, and she needs to start thinking about her future. It isn’t like Morty’s the kind of girl who’ll catch the eye of a rich guy she can latch onto.” And Morty couldn’t muster the energy to be hurt by the statement for how tense she was.

“Woah, _ouch_ ,” Summer intoned but some of the sympathy was cut down by the cascade of giggles she stifled by sinking her teeth into a lime wedge.

Even with his face turned away from her, Morty could tell Rick was fighting off a wave of anger by the way he shifted his weight to center and went completely still, his aura darkening subtly. And Morty could almost pretend… if she really wanted to let her imagination run wild, she could tell herself he was getting mad on _her_ account.

But it was more likely Rick just didn’t like being ordered around.

“She needs – she needs to go to class,” mom concluded, trailing off at the end, glancing up at Rick like she just remembered what happened the _last_ time she’d told Rick what he could and couldn’t do with her youngest daughter. Morty practically watched it play out across her expression – the way her frustration melted away, lengthening the planes of mom’s face until her eyes were too big and watery, her chin trembling below a pouting mouth.

And Morty was vividly reminded of what happened to _her_ the last time Rick got bullied out of controlling Morty – reminded of the bleak house without his presence and the haunted looks on mom and Summer’s faces and the long stay in the dark.

And she didn’t want to argue with him, didn’t want to _upset_ him, never wanted to wind up back in that bunker again, but mom looked like she was about to break out into tears and Summer was jangling the keys to her ship like she was itching to bail and Morty thought of Jessica’s number burning a hole through her cell phone – _just for a millisecond_ – before she shoved that thought away from prying, ice-blue eyes.

He’d just opened his mouth to start in on what would no doubt be a long, drunken ramble when Morty cut across him, “G - go with mom, Rick.”

Summer’s hazel eyes met hers across the kitchen and Morty – who still hadn’t remembered how to read her sister’s micro-expressions – couldn’t tell whether the look was meant to be condemning or bolstering. When Summer excused herself with, “You know what, keep the tequila, Grandpa,” Morty decided it had probably been a glare and internally screamed at the sound of her sister’s flats padding away and bouncing up the stairs even though she couldn’t blame her for taking an easy out. _Jeez_ what she wouldn’t give to have the ability to walk away. And if she thought her mom might appreciate Morty taking her side, she was vastly mistaken. Now there were two sets of cold eyes narrowed in her direction, nearly identical except for the color.

Morty turned back to the sink and washed her hands, trying to keep them from shaking. “Y - yeah, it’d be – it’s like doing the whole college-visit thing,” she forced herself to say, keeping her tone light and clueless, like she _wasn’t_ being pummeled to death by the sea of emotions they’d both just poured into the kitchen.

“And it’s not like you were around for those the _last_ time…” mom mumbled under her breath and Morty tried not grit her teeth in frustration. _Guilting_ Rick did jack-shit to get him to do what you wanted him to do – in fact, most of the time it only helped settle him firmly in a position to resist. Wasn’t that obvious?

But miraculously Rick was still boring into Morty like he was trying to work out what angle she was playing and Morty stood her ground, positive she was motivated by _at least_ ninety percent good intentions.

The kitchen towel was close to Rick and she smiled at him as placatingly as possible as she padded over, leaning against the counter just _barely_ out his personal bubble while she dried her hands, their hips nearly touching. ‘ _I’m not trying to get away from you_ ,’ she tried to tell him with her body language, and she didn’t miss the way his eyes swept over her from top to toe before he tilted his head and cracked his neck, his brow lowering in a V.

She resisted the temptation to take his hand in hers but settled for pinching the cuff of his lab coat and giving it a friendly wiggle. Mom was _right there_ , but her gaze was a little uneven and the elbow she had propped up on the counter to support her head kept overbalancing and mom already bitched about how ‘ _clingy_ ’ Morty was so maybe she wouldn’t think anything of it. Rick’s wrist knocked against Morty’s fingers and something unspoken passed between them at the contact, his chest rising and falling as he took three deep breaths, his eyes so dark Morty was sure she’d fall right into them whether her mother was standing there and watching or not.

‘ _Please_ ’ Morty mouthed to Rick, pointedly jerking her head in her mother’s direction.

Rick tilted the tequila bottle up to his lips and let his electric gaze sizzle appraisingly to mom who canted over and nearly fell off the stool, righting herself with a loud scrape of wood against tile. When Rick turned back to Morty, his brow was furrowed contemplatively, a strange squint to the corners of his eyes making his penetrating observation extra intense. He almost looked… _sympathetic_ wasn’t the right word but it cropped up into her mind immediately none the less.

“I’ll be here, Rick. I’ll go to class and come home and watch TV. It’ll be fine. It’ll be _boring_.” She leaned around him to fish a cup out of the cabinet, a pretext to whisper into his chest, “ _I think mom needs this, Rick._ ”

When Morty pulled back she let their eyes meet, the static spark of his gaze making her heart race, _willing_ him to see her sincerity, pleading with him to do her this favor.

When he sighed resignedly looking annoyed but compliant, she couldn’t help the too-wide smile she turned to the floor, purposely brushing his arm with hers when she crossed to the sink to fill her cup with water.

“ _But… save Super Earth for me_?” she asked quietly – _privately_ \- and the lines around Rick’s eyes smoothed out, a heavy hand landing on her head and ruffling her hair a little rougher than his norm but that could be thanks to the tequila.

“ _You owe me one for this, bud_ ,” he whispered back, eyes sparking and Morty shifted her weight, pressing her thighs together and doing her best to ignore the burn of her mother’s eyes on her back. “Ye- _eeaaugh_ -ah I can make some time for that, Beth,” Rick said loudly from between his clenched teeth, his tone obviously fake to Morty, but mom lit up like a fucking torch and Morty saw an opportunity to sneak out of the kitchen while they worked out their plans for the next day.

As she passed through the doorway into the living room making a quick exit, Rick turned to watch her go, something hidden behind the flat line of his eyebrow and the stern frown on his lips. Something that made her already racing heart pick up speed and caught her breath up in her throat. Something that glittered in the blacks of his eyes (the right one glinting just a little bit brighter) and threatened to suck Morty in.

She walked slowly (and loudly) up the stairs to her bedroom, the faint sounds of Summer’s music humming through the wall even after she closed her bedroom door and stood stock still in the center of the bedroom that hadn’t really felt like _hers_ for a while, taking deep, even breaths, willing herself to forget the burn of mom’s frigid eyes.

She pressed a hand to the base of her throat and squeezed but it was too warm - _nothing_ like cold steel. She sighed and dragged her palm lower until her fingers found the pendant and closed over it tight.

Her phone was almost dead and she used that as an excuse to swipe open the screen and stare at the selfie of her and Rick she’d set as her background. It had been taken in the gritty bathroom of an alien bar in the middle of a concert – the music loud and angry and totally up Rick’s ally, audible even in the stall they’d locked themselves into where Morty could cling to the top of the door and Rick could pound into her hard enough to knock a couple screws loose from the metal cubicle walls.

She wasn’t sure what compelled her to ask for a picture after they’d cooled off – her collapsed on top of him where he sprawled across a disgusting toilet seat like the filth meant nothing to him because it probably didn’t. Maybe it was the whole getting-shot-in-the-gut-thing which had only happened a week or so before and still felt too fresh to Morty who woke up every morning in a blind-panic. Maybe it was the thoughts that followed her startled awakenings, the ones that dwelled on Rick’s impermanence in her life; his ability to walk away with almost no trace, the likelihood of someone murdering him, the inevitability of old age. Maybe it was that after two weeks of missing it, wanting it, _begging_ for it, he’d finally relented and _slammed_ into her, rough and hard and overwhelming – the kind of sex that blocked out every thought in her head but the endless chanting of _Rick Rick Rick Rick_ that her heart ticked out like a metronome.

Whatever the case was, once she’d refastened the few buttons Rick hadn’t managed to tear off in his ferocity and kissed away the thin film of sweat Rick had worked up on his brow, she’d pulled her phone out of her back pocket and cradled it in her hands looking conflicted enough that Rick noticed her unease.

“Got a call to make, _Moooooorty_?” he asked, his voice low and hard to discern over the pounding music and the rush of drunk voices on the other side of the stall.

“I – _no_ -” she frowned, swiping over to the camera app and turning her head up to study his face where it loomed over her – close and curious and painfully dear. “Can we umm – _would you_ …”

Rick glanced between her flushed face and the phone in her hand before he quirked his unibrow at her and smirked. “Want to commemorate the moment, Morty?”

It was hard not to breathe out a sigh of relief but she swallowed it down, nodding jerkily.

He took the phone from her and spun her around until her back slotted against his chest, his body curving to fit against her like a parentheses. He leaned down enough so that their faces were right next to each other, his cheek brushing her hair. He stretched out a long arm, growled “Okay Morty, say ‘ _fuck everyone_ ’,” into her ear, and in the forward facing camera, she watched him shutter an achingly sincere smile with a very punk-rock grimace, looping his free arm over her shoulder to properly fit his raised middle finger in frame.

It was so casual, so perfectly Rick and yet so utterly unexpected, she burst out laughing.

That was the picture, Rick scowling and looking fierce while she covered half her face with a hand and laughed, mouth wide and eyes squinted closed and _happy_ looking. _Really_ happy looking. She wasn’t sure why the joy on her own face always surprised her but even just recalling the memory, her mouth threatened to tilt up into a smile.

Morty bit her lip and after too long silently contemplating the photograph (studying the softer lines around Rick’s eyes, the way his arm looped around her shoulder, the way his chin nudged at her hair), she reluctantly pulled up her messaging app. Her conversation with Rick was at the top – he’d sent her a meme he found in the middle of dinner before mom had turned her attention to conversation. Below that was the family text chain, the majority of the messages reading ‘ _won’t be home for dinner_ ’, the sender alternating between everyone but her.

Below that was a text from a city councilman she’d gotten during the election a few months prior (not like she was even old enough to vote) and below that a message in an alien script Rick had laughed uproariously at because he said it was a scam trying to get her galactic ID number by threatening to feed her to something called ‘The Galmorfian Terror’.

The last person on her message list was dad, his final text ‘ _U have any $$ I could borrow?_ ’, and even just reading it, Morty sighed. Dad would have _hated_ mom going off to study medicine at an alien school. He might have even tried to sabotage it in some way – trail along on the visit they were going to tomorrow and get mom banned or blow the place up accidentally or embarrass her so bad she never wanted to show her face there again.

Instead Rick was taking her - not that he didn’t get into his fair share of bullshit, but at least he could actually handle whatever fiasco he found himself in - so the two of them would be just fine. Hopefully Rick wouldn’t run into anything that needed her brainwaves or her smaller hands but he knew how to lay low. And this was _good_ for mom – exactly what she always wanted.

So even if mom was… a little meaner to Morty… things were better now. Probably.

Taking a deep breath, Morty pulled up a new message and typed ‘ _Jessica_ ’ into the contact bar, her heart racing when it auto-filled the ten digits she had memorized and the name flanked by emoji redheads.

She might _actually_ have some free time tomorrow; maybe even most of the day without Rick or mom or anyone else to bitch at her about doing the dishes or drag her into the spaceship and take off with her for days. Suddenly Jessica’s offer of a study date seemed so much more attainable but instead of the flush of joy she _expected_ to feel at that revelation, a stark dread spread tendrils of unease through her stomach. And trying to work out _why_ she felt so anxious about something she would have been so happy about before ( _before_ before) made her head ache so she decided to ignore the sensation while the cursor blinked in the message bar.

She might never get an opportunity like this again. Rick didn’t make a habit of giving her space and she couldn’t _ask_ him to leave her alone for a few hours so she could cozy up with Jessica and do homework and watch Netflix because for whatever reason, he’d probably flip a shit. And she hated ( _hated_ ) that the thought immediately sparked a flame of guilt in her gut that nearly made her nauseous - but _it was Jessica_ : the girl who had starred most of Morty’s masturbatory fantasies since she’d discovered orgasms (‘ _until Rick came along_ ’ her brain unhelpfully supplied).

Morty frowned.

But he was _Rick_ fucking _Sanchez_. He told her enough stories from his past, divulged enough of his sexual exploits, for her to know it wasn’t like she was the _only_ one he was fucking. Was she his most regular partner? Probably. But the longer she brewed on the long stretch of time in the bunker when he’d punished her with abstinence, the harder it became to willfully close her eyes to the likely truth.

Rick was an addict through and through. If he wasn’t getting his fix from her, he must have been getting it from _somewhere._

And it wasn’t like she could _cheat_ on Rick because they weren’t even dating or monogamous or _whatever_. They’d been doing this for months – whatever the fuck _this_ was – and they’d never once talked about it except for the possessive bullshit Rick sprouted when he was buried inside of her. But Morty very clearly remembered an occasion where _Rick_ had told her never to trust what someone said during sex and Rick would know way more about that kind of thing than she did.

If Morty were being honest with herself, it was something that niggled in the back of her mind constantly – _what were they?_ – but she was way too much of a wuss to bring it up. And Rick avoided discussing his feelings like they were the plague so… yeah… she wasn’t holding her breath waiting for ‘ _the talk_ ’.

Not that she needed to have a discussion to know Rick would _definitely_ be pissed if he found out she’d Netflix-and-chilled with Jessica after she’d practically shanghaied him into spending the day with mom, even if that totally made him a hypocrite. He’d be ultra-mega pissed, probably. Maybe even locked-back-up-in-the-bunker pissed.

So Morty was left asking herself: _would it be worth it_?

Her long contemplation of that question was interrupted when she heard Rick assist a staggering mom through the hall and Morty used the commotion (mom knocked into every piece of furniture in her bedroom on the way to the master bathroom before loudly vomiting) to open up her door, quietly pad down the stairs, and sneak into Rick’s room undetected.

Whatever she wound up deciding about Jessica, the urge to express her gratitude for Rick’s unexpectedly moldable behavior compelled her to strip off her clothes and slip in between his bedsheets nude, something strange and big bouncing around her stomach and trying to squeeze into all the holes life had poked right through her. She wound up scowling face-down into the pillow, torn between taking a chance with her lifetime crush or behaving herself for a man who would probably jump at an opportunity to bang a beautiful red-head without once wondering how Morty might feel about it.

She heard his feet padding down the stairs early enough that she had time to flop back over and school her features into something less conflicted and it was worth it. An almost-soft smile quirked Rick’s lips up when he swung open his door and she peeked at him from where she’d buried herself under his quilt, hope and guilt twisting her stomach into knots.

“That’s some grade - _uuuuurp-_ A sneaking, Morty,” he hummed, low and raspy and intimate, his face a mosaic of warm light and shadows cast by his bedside table lamp. “I didn’t even hear you leave your room.”

And _jeez_ how fucked up was she that his miniscule scrap of bizarre praise blew her up like a balloon?

“It’s really nice of you to do that for mom,” she told him, shuffling towards the edge of the bed on her knees and sliding her hands under his lab coat. His chest was firm and solid below her fingers, rising and falling with his steady breaths. She tried to match their breathing, closing her eyes and pressing her forehead to his sternum, her heart aching with too many feelings. “Th – thanks for doing it, Rick.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Rick grumbled, but Morty could tell from the tone that he wasn’t displeased with her adoration.

“She’s –” Morty didn’t want to get into it, didn’t want to explain the crippling weight of her mother’s constant glare or the way she felt like there was nothing she could do that would make her happy or the way being in that house when her mother was home felt like she was suffocating, her lungs filling up with noxious goop, a vine around her ankle pulling her deeper and deeper into the muck, to a place so dark no sunlight filtered through to light the way back up.

But maybe… Rick had saved her from that once before… and _Rick_ was all she had.

“I – Rick, I don’t think she likes me anymore -” she whispered, cutting herself off with a dry sob, because apparently she _did_ want to talk about it. If she had known this was going to come pouring out of her, she wouldn’t have taken her clothes off – she already felt exposed enough – but she had to work with what she had, tugging the blanket over her shoulders like a massive cowl and feeling painfully young and stupid.

But instead of getting angry or brushing her off or calling her a crybaby, Rick caught up her cheek in his rough palm and kissed her forehead, wrapping his arms around her - quilt and all - and holding her tight. “Beths are like that, Morty,” he rumbled against her temple. “All of ‘em. Misplaced aggression and – _uuurp_ \- and a heaping dash of sociopathy. Blame genetics.” That might be the closest he’d ever come to apologizing for being… who he was, but Morty wasn’t going to point that out to him. Not when she was so torn between gasping in disbelief and dissolving into tears. “It’s not _you._ ”

The thought was vaguely comforting even if it rang false in her ears. After all, mom didn’t treat _Summer_ like this. But still, it was nice of him to try. Unexpected, even. And she had to reward that kind of behavior. “Thanks, Rick,” she muttered sliding her hands along his chest, brushing his lab coat over his shoulders and letting it _thump_ to the floor, the various things in his pockets clattering against each other.

Rick frowned; his face twisting up in aggravation and Morty was a little surprised he would _choose_ to pursue the conversation further when she’d given him an easy out. “ _No_ , Morty, I mean it. I always figured she’d turn out to be a – a serial killer or something, and in some universes – in an _above average number of universes_ \- she _is_.”

“Wh - yeah, but how many _yous_ are serial killers Rick?” she asked, suddenly curious, one of her eyebrows quirking up because she had a pretty good idea it was _a lot_. When a particularly guarded look shadowed his eyes, she realized how much she maybe didn’t actually want to know the answer so she hurried to amend her question, “I mean – isn’t that the whole idea of the multiverse? Everything exists somewhere? I’m probably a serial killer in a couple universes too.”

“There’s at least one,” Rick acknowledged and she didn’t need to ask to know he was talking about the boy-Morty she’d met during her horrific adventures on the Citadel, the one Rick scathingly dubbed ‘Evil-Morty’ when he got drunk and contemplative. The one that she dreamt about sometimes when she was particularly worn down – Rick on his knees, Evil-Morty behind him, holding a gun to his head. Morty always woke before he pulled the trigger, a strange mix of horror and anticipation freezing her in place right before her racing heart jolted her awake.

“ _My point is_ :” Rick restarted his ramble, kneading his forehead with one hand and bracing her shoulder with the other, “Don’t wo- _ooough-_ rry so much about your mom, Morty. She’s – she’s got her own shit to carry and you’re a good kid so you’re trying to help. But believe me, that’s the kind of thing you gotta let people work out on their own.”

“You make it sound so easy.”

He chuffed her under the chin and gave her a wink, ripping his sweater and tank top over his head in one smooth motion. “Just stick with me, bud,” he said playfully, shooting her a wink before he started unfastening his pants.

“That’s your solution to everything,” Morty grumbled and Rick’s rough chuckle filled the room right before he tackled her, his skin electric every place it touched hers.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

The next morning - after Rick shot a portal to Morty’s room with his eyes closed and she grabbed a change of clothes before she showered and dressed - she was only moderately surprised to see him up and ready for the day, already seated at the dining table and nursing a cup of coffee. She was significantly more surprised to see mom up, her head in her hands, a glass of water and a piece of undercooked toast pressed against her lips.

A bowl, a spoon, a box of cereal, and the jug of milk had been set out in front of Morty’s seat and she blinked, padding over the table and smiling despite herself. Rick was absorbed in something on his phone, his eyes scanning while his finger scrolled. And mom looked miserable, an open bottle of Aspirin at her elbow, slowly chewing a bite of toast with her eyes closed in obvious determination to work herself up to swallowing.

Morty seated herself as quietly as possible but mom still flinched at the scrape of her chair, squinting open one of her eyes to shoot Morty a brief glare before returning to her closed-eyed frown. It wasn’t until Morty was pouring milk on top of her bowl of dehydrated marshmallows that she wondered why Rick hadn’t given mom something stronger for her hangover – he had a million and one ways to erase the pain from a night of bad decision-making. Hadn’t he handed Morty a pill the morning after she’d gotten drunk on those fire-drinks and woken up with a pounding headache – one tiny blue pill that erased her migraine and settled her stomach and _literally_ un-split the ends of her hair?

As if he knew she was thinking about him, Rick shifted in his seat, setting down his coffee cup with a clattering thud and pointedly cleared his throat.

“Might be gone a while today, Morty,” Rick said, catching Morty’s eye and making no attempt to lower his voice to accommodate the hungover woman in the room. Mom didn’t say anything to him even though Morty was sure she would have shushed Morty if she’d started a conversation, though her grimace did become more pronounced.

“Kay.” Morty didn’t have the guts to speak in more than a whisper.

“We’ve got a lot of stops to make today if we want to hit up all the schools Beth wants to check out. Have to get an early start if we want to be back before dinner.”

“I’m working on it, Dad,” mom grumbled around the toast still pressed to her lips. “Give me fifteen minutes.” But she didn’t make any attempt to move and the bite of toast still bulged her cheek like a chipmunk.

The tiniest hint of a grin threatened to tug up the corner of Rick’s mouth and he cut a conspiratorial glance at Morty before he shrugged and picked his cup back up, eyes glued to his phone.

And Morty started to wonder…

She wondered whether Rick had literally dragged mom out of bed this morning like he did so often to Morty, the wake-up call abrupt and jarring and just about the furthest thing from gentle as humanly imaginable. And then she wondered whether Rick knew mom would be hungover and had done it on purpose, his payback for bullying him into something he didn’t want to do and then dictating the terms. It seemed petty enough to suit him and Morty decided that probably _was_ his intentions; that was why he hadn’t given her one of those impressive blue pills and why he refused to lower his voice – a passive aggressive stab at low-grade torture.

Morty couldn’t help the toxic sliver of vindication that threatened to curve up her own lips into a smile. How often did mom bitch about Morty being tired when she’d been dragged around by Rick all night? How often did mom then turn around and complain that _she_ never got to go out on adventures?

Well, here was her chance to try it out, see what it was like being _Morty_ for a day, trapped at the whims of a sadistic old bastard and lugged across the galaxy with little-to-no regard. Morty smiled against her spoon, her marshmallow cereal somehow _extra_ sweet.

While Morty tugged the straps of her backpack over her shoulders, she watched mom stagger up the stairs - eyes closed, one hand on the banister – back to feeling a little bad for her. Rick was annoyed and annoyed-Rick could be an extra-special jerk if he really put his mind to it. Morty had learned a few trick for uncoiling that snaggle of hostility Rick pulled out on occasions such as this but since mom had booted Morty off the trip, she’d have to figure out how to diffuse the time-bomb that was Rick on her own. As it was, the two of them got along as good as feral cats when they weren’t in top shape, so maybe it was a good thing Morty was staying home and going to summer school instead of spending the day trying to mediate.

Still, she hovered in the foyer doorway, stealing peeks at Rick as he started typing rapid fire on his phone. “See you tonight, Rick?”

He glanced up, fingers still taping across the screen, the corners of his mouth softening from a scowl into a frown. “Yeah. Why, you gonna miss me, buddy?”

He was being sarcastic, maybe even a little perverted, leering at her with a grin that showed too many teeth.

“Yeah,” she answered immediately and simply, keeping her tone light but sincere, and she had the satisfaction of watching the bite around the corner of his eyes melt away. ‘ _You’re welcome, mom_ ’ she thought viciously in her head, jogging over to Rick’s side and pressing a quick kiss to the receding hair at his temple. He caught her by the arm when she tried to pull away and tugged her down for a kiss on the lips – quick and chaste and breathtakingly gentle – before he let her go and she staggered back, too aware of the stupid smile on her face when Rick’s split into a slow smirk.

“See you tonight,” she called over her shoulder before she dashed out the front door and even though she didn’t turn around to check, she knew he was watching her run down the block – could feel his eyes on her all the way to the corner when the house slipped out of view.


	14. Chapter Fourteen

The only thing that stopped class from being mind-numbingly boring was the constant fretting.

Morty’s phone sat face-up on the desk in front of her, shielded from Mr. Goldenfold’s view by the math book she’d propped up on its very-damaged spine. A blank text with Jessica’s name at the top stared back at her - taunted her, _tortured_ her - with its promise of endless possibilities.

Because if she wanted to – if she could miraculously work up the courage to – _she could text Jessica_.

Except Rick was acting… _nice_ lately. Thoughtful, even, in his own warped way. And Morty _liked_ that - wanted to _encourage_ that – because she was really starting to think… maybe it _wasn’t_ all her, maybe it _wasn’t_ all in her head, maybe everything wasn’t _completely_ one-sided.

Morty pointedly ground that thought to a halt and banished it to the back of her mind.

Rick wasn’t the issue right now. _Jessica_ was the issue; gorgeous, too perfect to be real Jessica - with her shining copper hair and glowing green eyes. If Morty texted her, she might even see her again today, might even _talk_ to her two days in a row. That hadn’t happened since the fieldtrip.

On the other hand, texting a girl like Jessica to hang out on the same day might be late notice.

Jessica was popular, she had a multitude of friends to choose from, and her Instagram led Morty to believe she was almost always out with an ever-growing and changing population of them - sipping trendy coffees from overpriced cafes, hanging out at barbeques in huge backyards, going to the beach (wherever the fuck the _beach_ was in their landlocked middle-American town).

Morty – with her unfashionable clothing and terrible stutter and massive list of personality flaws – probably wouldn’t be a priority if Jessica had other plans. And if Jessica tried to reschedule, if she sent back, ‘ _today doesn’t work, how bout Thursday?_ ’ or some shit, how the fuck was Morty supposed to respond?

‘ _Oh, well, it’s kind of today or never because my grandpa – who I regularly have sex with btw – is kind of the controlling type and today’s the only day I’ll probably ever have a chance to meet up with you alone_ ’?

Jeez. She broke out in a cold sweat just thinking about it.

In the end, her indecision made up her mind for her, the end-of-class bell startling her out of her thoughts, her jerking arm sending her book and cellphone flying while the curly-haired kid sitting behind her snickered. It was _definitely_ too late to text Jessica now. Morty wasn’t entirely sure why the thought made her feel so relieved but she knew better than to examine that too closely.

The walk home was hot and miserable - so much more so because she felt like such a loser. The universe had given her an opportunity and she was too chicken-shit to snatch it up. And Rick - who usually made a very good distraction from her never-ending self-hatred – wasn’t even around to take her out for ice cream or bend her over the washing machine and fuck her until she forgot about how much she despised herself.

But if she couldn’t have the company she wanted, at least she could still get the ice cream.

Without any better plans for the long evening ahead of her, Morty wandered into the gas station she passed on her walk to and from school, grabbing a Choco Taco with some of the earth bills Rick occasionally handed to her like he was doling out an allowance. She stood in the shade of the gas station awning and tried (but mostly failed) to eat it before it melted while sucking in hot exhaust, determinedly ignoring how the smell of engines and gasoline were reminding her of a man she _couldn’t_ already miss because it had only been a few hours.

It was like that – with chocolate smeared at the corner of her mouth and ice cream dripping down her forearm – that Morty heard someone shout, “Morty!” and she twirled around fast, prepared for an attack, her hardwired adventuring programing slamming her adrenaline into gear.

But it wasn’t Rick like she’d half expected, sick of mom and popping up unexpectedly to drag her through a portal. Nor was it Summer, back from her long trip to wherever and willing to give Morty a ride. No, of all the people it could have been, Morty should have known it would be _Jessica_ , jumping out of her cliché red convertible dressed all in white (a tennis outfit from the athletic look of her short skirt and polo; something Morty recognized more from pornos than from real life) and jogging over to the curb with a spring in her step.

“J - _Jessica_?!” Morty gasped and immediately choked on the waffle cone-taco shell she’d been trying to swallow. She was bent over and hacking when Jessica ran up, her small hand patting Morty gently on the back while Morty coughed and coughed and wished she’d cough up her lung and just die right there.

“Oh my god, Morty, I didn’t mean to scare you,” Jessica said breathily, concern lacing her voice. And Morty tried hard _not_ to spew chunks of cone and chocolate onto Jessica’s perfect skin or her bright white polo but judging from the discreet but not undetectable way Jessica brushed a hand over her arm like she was wiping something away, Morty knew she hadn’t succeeded.

“I - I’m good,” Morty said unconvincingly after another round of coughs, her eyes watering from forcing her uncooperative body under control. “I - I’m t - totally good.”

Jessica didn’t look convinced but backed off a little in a benevolent attempt to allow Morty to conserve the barest crumbs of her dignity. 

“You just get out of class?” Jessica asked once Morty finally got her breathing under control and scrubbed at her mouth with the back of her wrist, _horrified_ to see how much chocolate smeared off onto her arm.

Jeez, of all the times for Jessica to run into her around town it had to be _now_ , when she was sticky and covered in ice cream like a little kid. Why couldn’t this have happened a few days ago, when Rick sent her out to the hardware store with a roll of bills and a pistol tucked into the back of her pants like a badass? 

But there was only one undeniable truth Morty gave any credence to: _the universe_ hated _her_.

Morty jerked, realizing too late that Jessica had been waiting for her to answer. “Y - yeah, you know, _math_.” Ugh, why was she _the worst_? “What about - what about you, Jessica? Just coming from - uh - some kind of tennis thing?”

“Yeah, my dad keeps signing me up for lessons at the club every summer.” She rolled her eyes and Morty was left wracking her brain for what ‘ _club_ ’ Jessica was talking about - like, a tennis club? or a rec-center? or was it like a secret society, rich people thing? - but she didn’t want to sound stupid by asking.

“Oh, that’s… cool.” And it kinda was. Hobbies were cool. But Morty could also hear Rick’s raspy voice in the back of her head saying ‘ _it’s kinda_ bougie _too_ ’ though she vigorously ignored that. Tennis was obviously a way more acceptable extracurricular than wreaking havoc across the multiverse and fucking your grandfather so who was Morty to judge?

“It’s dorky, isn’t it?” Jessica asked, a self-recriminating grimace that was entirely too adorable (and somehow erased Rick’s voice from the back of Morty’s mind completely) scrunching up her face.

Morty hurried to reassure her, stammering, “N - n - no! No, it’s - it’s really cool. You any good?”

“Eh - I’m okay.” Jessica’s finger had found the curled edge of her hair and Morty was transfixed by the way the sunlight bounced off golden-red strands. “I really mostly go cause the instructor’s hot.”

“Oh.” Morty blinked. What could she say to that? That she was simultaneously insanely jealous of a faceless instructor for being the object of Jessica’s passing infatuation? Or that she was unbearably curious what someone who could catch _Jessica’s_ eye would look like? Both seemed… creepy… so she frantically searched for something more normal to say, hyper-aware of the seconds ticking by.

But after a moment’s pause, Jessica shook herself and hurried to add, “In a way-too-old-to-actually-mess-around-with kinda way, you know? I mean he’s probably almost thirty…”

And _there_ was the crippling stomach pain that usually struck when Morty spent any prolonged period of time talking to someone who wasn’t Rick. If Jessica thought _thirty_ was old, _jeez_ , what would she think of Morty for regularly fucking an old man? A drooling, alcoholic, perverted, weirdly enigmatic, _incredibly skilled_ old man…

_Shit_ she had to stop thinking about Rick and _say something_. “O - oh yeah…”

“And like, my dad’s still bent on me getting a sports scholarship but I don’t know,” Jessica continued and Morty was glad for the distraction until her brain started processing the words. “I don’t really want _sports_ to be my thing, you know? Like, maybe I want to major in science or something. Or I dunno, I’ve been thinking about social work a lot these days...”

That tidal wave of anxiety that sometimes threatened to crush all the air out of Morty rose again like a tsunami. _Scholarships, college, careers_ ; all of it was so distant from Morty and what she knew would be her future (assuming she’d even lived to see eighteen) that Jessica may as well be speaking another language. 

“But anyways, you don’t have any plans this afternoon, do you Morty?”

“I - uh - no, I - I guess not,” Morty answered vacantly, wondering how many more of her bones Rick would have had to replace with metal (besides the ribs and vertabra he’d already done when she’d been shot through the stomach) by the time Jessica moved into a dorm. How many more planets Morty would have seen destroyed by the time Jessica got her first acceptance letter. How many other Morties would be scraping up whatever SAT or ACT or whatever fucking test scores they needed to get into an okay college while she probably would spend her graduation ceremony off-planet, robot-Morty accepting her diploma on her behalf.

Morty was so distracted by her inability to picture what her life would look in two months from then let alone _two years_ down the line that she didn’t properly understand Jessica offer until she was watching Jessica sink her teeth into the plush of her bottom lip. “I’ve got a couple hours. If you wanted me to, I could take a look at your math homework or something.”

_Wait, what_?

“Oh, you - I mean - you _don’t have to_ -” Because seriously, Morty wasn’t prepared. If she had known she was going to see Jessica, she would have brushed her hair. She would have put on one of her nicer tops. She wouldn’t have stopped to get an ice cream and let it melt all over her fucking face.

But Jessica looked _hopeful_ in a way that was simultaneously crushing Morty’s heart in a vice grip and lifting her three feet off the ground. “I don’t mind, Morty, really.” And her finger twisted her curl again, the line of her hand drawing Morty’s attention back to Jessica’s glossy, extra pink lips.

“Oh - kay… I - uhm - if it’s not –” _oh woah_ , _what was she doing_ , “- _yeah_ , Jessica, I – uh - I’d really like that.”

Holy shit. Had her mouth just _said that_? Did she just agree to spend an afternoon with _Jessica_?!

Jessica’s face lit up with a smile that nearly blinded Morty. “Your place or mine?”

_Holy shit_ this was a bad idea. Rick would lose his mind. Morty would be in so much trouble. And why the fuck was that sending a prickle of anticipation up her spine? _What was wrong with her_?

But maybe… Okay, maybe she _could_ get away with it, if she was careful. It wasn’t like she spent a lot of time thinking about it but somehow an idea popped into her mind fully formed and she considered briefly that the back of her brain might have been working on the problem all along.

Rick had a tracker on her – and she had pieced together a while ago that he kept an eye on her location when they weren’t together - but if she went _home_ , nothing would be out of the ordinary. Jessica could come over for a few hours, leave before he and mom got back, and no one would ever have to know Morty hadn’t spent the afternoon on the couch binge watching intergalactic cartoons.

It was… well she had never tried to sneak around on Rick before. The guy was omnipotent. And it felt like a bad idea already. But Jessica was standing there looking like she’d just stepped out a commercial for sunscreen - glowing and vibrant and _warm_ \- and Morty knew she had to try or she’d hate herself forever.

“M - mine,” Morty stammered, shocked at her own boldness.

“Great,” Jessica said, turning back to her car, her hips swinging as she led the way. “Hop in.”

And Morty might have followed in a daze like a zombie if it weren’t for the crumpled up wrapper leaking a steady stream of melted ice cream onto the pavement next to her sneaker. “Actually, let me -” she held up her sticky hands by way of explanation. “I - I’ll be _right_ back.”

She practically ran through the gas station market to the grungy bathroom against the back wall, vaulting a mop and bucket that had been left in the middle of the doorway and stumbling up to the sink. 

With reckless haste, Morty scrubbed her hands and her forearms splashing water all over her shirt and pants but she didn’t care that she probably looked like a fucking mess - it was _impossible_ to imagine perfect, popular Jessica waiting on _her_.

When she started rubbing water over her still slightly chocolatey mouth, she caught her own eyes in the mirror and paused.

It was _just_ an afternoon studying. It didn’t mean anything, _obviously_. And yeah, okay, so Jessica was spectacular and had her whole normal life ahead of her paved with above-average achievements and sure she was stupid-gorgeous and Morty was distinctly _not_ …

But that didn’t mean Morty couldn’t pretend for _one afternoon_ that she could still _sometimes_ be a normal kid. She hadn’t completely crossed over yet, had she? Yeah, sure she’d been imprisoned in her own basement not too very long ago and yeah, she was in a fairly mysterious and very secretive relationship with a man four times her age and her _grandfather_ and yeah, she was a walking- _fucking_ -disaster, but she could have this one normal thing, right?

She dried her hands on her jeans and tucked the glowing star pendant underneath the collar of her shirt.

...Yeah. She _deserved_ this one normal fucking thing _._ The _universe_ wanted her to have it, practically handed it to her on a silver platter.

If Rick found out, he’d be _furious_ , but… she couldn’t say no to the universe, right?

Her chin jerked in the mirror in a rough imitation of a nod and she hightailed it back through the shop.

Even though Jessica wasn’t the type to bail, it still surprised Morty to find her waiting at the pump, heart-shaped sunglasses shielding her eyes, a smile curving up her lips when Morty stumbled out of the automatic doors in a blind panic.

“Ready?” Jessica called, smiling and looking perfect and cool and unattainable.

‘ _Not at all_ ’ her brain whispered unhelpfully.

“Y – yeah,” she answered out loud.

As soon as they pulled out of the gas station, Morty wished she lived farther away. The leather seats were hot from the sun and when they were moving, the wind was too loud for much conversation outside of Morty’s shouted directions, but to say it was a dream come true was an understatement. 

Jessica only drove her _friends_ around - her red convertible was infamous at school, half because it was ostentatious and half because only the kids with something interesting to offer ever had a chance to sit inside.

And now _Morty_ was one of those kids.

Besides that, it was liberating to be out with something close to an equal for once in her life. Rick drove her around in the ship all the time (or sometimes she drove him when he was wasted or lazy or busy trying to build something to save their asses) but they weren’t exactly _equals_. Extremely rarely, Summer would be in a good enough mood to drive Morty around with her on errands but it wasn’t often she got to borrow the car and Morty hadn’t _once_ sat in her new ship. And since Morty didn’t exactly _have friends_ , she’d never been alone with a schoolmate in a car. It felt teenager-y and exhilarating. Jessica listened to her music louder than mom ever allowed (though not louder than drunk-Rick liked sometimes) and barely stopped at stop signs and didn’t use a turning signal – not even _once_. 

But even the prospect of dying seemed less offensive if she’d be doing it in _Jessica’s car_.

Morty briefly considered purposely giving wrong directions, just so she’d have an excuse to spend a little longer basking in the glow of Jessica’s freedom but in the end, she decided not knowing the way to her own house would be too pathetic, even for her, and they turned onto her street too soon.

“There - with the -”

“- Spaceship?” Jessica laughed and the sound lit up Morty’s insides like her guts were wrapped in fairy lights. “Not too hard to guess, Morty.”

Summer’s ship was missing but Rick’s was still parked in the driveway. The sight of it almost instigated a mini-panic attack but he and mom had probably taken the portal gun so there was no reason to feel so anxious. Now if only her body would get the message and stop telling her heart to pound and her hands to sweat, she’d be a whole lot happier.

Jessica pulled up alongside the front curb and when she killed the engine, Morty thought she might have an aneurysm. 

(What if the house smelled weird? What if mom was passed out drunk on the couch? What if something in there unknowingly gave away what she did with Rick? _What if Rick was home_?)

But the thought of telling Jessica she’d changed her mind and sending her home seemed like an absolutely impossible feat so she sucked up all her indecision and swung the car door open.

The corner of it immediately lodged in the grass and there was a moment where Morty had to frantically tug at the door handle - desperate and embarrassed as Jessica bounced around the front of the car - before the door unstuck and the metal scraped a line of turf up as it closed. Morty’s quick sigh of relief was short lived when Jessica eyed the dirt caked on the bottom of her car door as she passed and Morty stammered an awful, “S - sorry, Jessica,” around a slightly-hysterical laugh. 

“Oh, whatever, it’s fine,” Jessica said, because _of course_ that’s what she’d say – she was fucking perfect – but Morty still wanted to shrivel up in shame.

Awesome. Things were off to a great start. 

Morty’s shaking hands struggled with the key at the front door but she managed to open it without dropping anything or damaging any more property and apparently the bar was low enough that she celebrated her small success. 

“C - Come on in.”

Morty hadn’t ever thought about how plain and vaguely dingy the foyer of her house was until she was stepping into the dim interior and looking around trying to see what Jessica might be seeing.

Her mom and dad’s taste in decorating was bland and a little tacky, Morty had always thought so but the truth of that blared especially loud now that there was someone she wanted to impress standing in the doorway. The embarrassing family picture that used to hang on the front wall had thankfully been replaced by a floral print mom had found in the bargain bin of some discount shop - Morty was pretty sure it was a Van Gogh or something like that, but she didn’t know art – and even though it was step up from the fake smiles and gaudy yellow blazer mom had forced her to wear when she was twelve and they all went to the photo studio in the mall, it wasn’t by much.

Not for the first time as she stepped into the house, Morty felt an overwhelming surge of relief that dad… wasn’t around anymore. If he were still at home, no doubt he’d have already poked his head into the room and made a big deal about Morty bringing someone over - and if he found out this girl was _Jessica_ , he’d _absolutely_ blab the fact that Morty’s open crush on her was fairly common knowledge in the Smith house.

Then he’d probably ogle Jessica (Morty had caught him staring down the low cut shirt of the teenager who scooped ice cream too many times) and Morty would rather die than submit Jessica to that sort of bullshit. He’d follow them around the house and burst into rooms without knocking and try to ‘hang out’ with them because he was bored and lonely and self-centered.

Morty breathed out an almost non-existent sigh - a silent ‘thank you’ to the universe for saving her that one small but unimaginably awkward scenario. She hated herself for it all anew, but yeah - she couldn’t exactly _miss_ dad. Not entirely.  

There was a scorch mark on the wall at the bottom of the steps from where Rick had shot an alien parasite. No one left at home _cared_ about that sort of thing since dad wasn’t around so it went unpainted and Morty’s eyes had learned to drift right over it. Now the mark was a strange point of embarrassment, especially when Jessica’s attention landed on it immediately, her hand rubbing at the blackened paint mark while Morty turned to shut the door and hide her grimace.

“Oh – y – yeah, uh, you know. Living with Rick is…” _Messy? Stressful? The only part of Morty’s short life that was any fun or had any meaning?_

“Unpredictable…?” Jessica filled in the blank and Morty’s brain rebooted.

Morty laughed, the sound a little stilted but not insincere. “Yeah. That.”

She led the way into the living room, hyperaware of Jessica following behind her, Morty’s gaze darting wildly around for anything too awful or suspicious to have lying around. The worst it got was one empty wine bottle left on the coffee table, the bottom sticky with a red ring.

Morty gestured to the couch. “Here, uh – be right back…” Morty scrambled for the remote and flicked on the TV. Whoever had been watching it last had tuned into the dimension populated by hamsters who made their homes in people’s butts and Jessica jerked in surprise.

“ _What the_ _heck_ …”

“Oh, yeah - it’s interdimensional cable. Uh - TV from all across the multiverse. Here,” she held out the remote to Jessica who took it, eyes still glued on the television where two little hamsters were in the middle of a big romantic movie kissing scene - pouring rain and everything - except the lower halves of them were concealed by bare human asses. “Flip through and you’ll find some real – some real weird stuff.”

Jessica turned back to Morty, blinking away a daze.

“I’m just gonna –” Morty snatched up the wine bottle and dashed into the kitchen, tossing it into the recycling and wetting a rag to wipe down the table, her cheeks oddly hot.

Jessica, however, didn’t seem to think Morty frantically cleaning up the evidence of her mother’s drinking problem was worth much attention when there were far more interesting things on TV. She had switched over a few channels and was now watching the psychedelic swirling patterns and hypnotic music popular with the cloud people of Teregano – the one Rick and Summer liked to watch after they lit up a joint in the garage, staring red-eyed at the screen while they passed a box of Cheez-Its back and forth.

Once the table was free of sticky wine stains, Morty dashed back into the kitchen and strained her ears for any other signs of life in the house. She _had_ to be sure – what if mom and Rick had never left? What if mom was passed out upstairs and Rick was working in the garage? Rick would _flip_ if he walked in on Jessica sitting in their living room – Morty only ever heard him repeat back her name in disdain when she was brought up in conversation so she had to assume he probably hated her – and mom… well it might be better if people didn’t know about her low burning anger, excessive drinking, and open hatred for Morty. And the idea of _Jessica_ seeing first-hand the constant derision that was Morty’s home life was too embarrassing to bear.

“I - I’ll be right back!” she called out a little frantically, swinging open the garage door and peering around the dark space. No Rick. Okay. _Good._ Now the rest of the house.

She peeked into Rick’s room on the way to the stairs but the bed was empty and made (it made itself – Rick would never bother with that sort of shit otherwise) and she relaxed infinitesimally. She thundered up the stairs and peeked through mom’s open door but the room was empty, the blinds still shut from the night before. Summer’s door was unlocked – sign enough that her sister wasn’t inside – but Morty still knocked before she cracked open the door and double checked, breathing out a sigh of relief when she didn’t unexpectedly meet a pair of glaring hazel eyes.

With that settled (and relief flared so hot and fast through Morty that she slouched against Summer’s doorway deflated) she finally _actually_ let herself believe the situation she had found herself in:

She was home alone. _With Jessica._ Maybe the universe _didn’t_ hate her…

When the anxiety she had purposely explained away as fear of being caught didn’t disappear with proof that she was in the clear, Morty had no choice but to acknowledge that it wasn’t just the possibility of Rick’s anger putting her on edge; it was the thought of spending private, one-on-one time with Jessica making her heart race in a not-exactly-pleasant kind of way.

What – what did teenagers do together when they hung out? What were they supposed to talk about? Should she offer a drink or a snack? What did they have in the fridge anyways besides beer and wine and leftover curry from Io? She was better prepared to host a pack of Traflorkians than another teenage girl.

Or was she actually supposed to pull out her homework? Doing that seemed like it would be a waste of this rare opportunity (and how the fuck was Morty supposed to _care_ about math right now) but that _was_ the pretense Jessica had used to come over.

The voice in her head that spoke in Rick’s voice piped up with the noxious thought; maybe Jessica really _did_ want to help her with schoolwork. Maybe she wanted to be able to claim ‘ _math tutor to the mentally challenged_ ’ to help fluff out her college applications. Maybe Morty was nothing more than a pity-project, a brief taste of the social work Jessica was thinking of pursuing.

That thought nearly made Morty’s legs buckle, mostly because it made a lot more sense than the alternative which was that Jessica inexplicably decided she liked Morty’s company. And even though she _knew_ it was Rick’s paranoia rubbing off on her, the thought that Jessica must have come with some sort of ulterior motive kept niggling away at her thoughts, eating through her brain like a hungry worm.

A year and half of adventuring somehow hadn’t prepared her for this - that was obvious from the way she lifted her hands to watch them tremble with nerves. She’d had steadier hands blasting that Urganon through the head. But she wasn’t about to waste an opportunity literally _handed to her_. She wasn’t such a fucking coward.

So Morty mustered her courage, unglued her feet from where they’d been locked to the floor, and padded down the stairs slowly, reluctant to join Jessica on the couch now that she knew they were very much alone. Even the sight of the back of Jessica’s head had Morty debating dashing out the door – it was just too much to handle, Morty wasn’t _normal_ no matter how much she wished she was – but she picked up her discarded backpack on her way through the foyer and tossed it onto the armchair, just in case Jessica _did_ actually want to look at her homework.

Morty was so focused on acting normal and trying not to trip as she crept around the couch and settled on the ground between the coffee table and the sofa (Jessica’s freckled knees near her shoulder but a safe distance away, their bodies separated by a height difference that put Morty more at ease) that she didn’t notice the strange slurping and moaning coming from the TV until she was fully settled onto the carpet.

For some reason, it wasn’t immediately obvious what was happening on the show Jessica had landed on – two shades of reddish-pink crushed against each other and writhing. Morty _should_ have recognized it for what it was immediately but there was something about the unexpectedness of _Jessica_ picking it out of literally a million possible channels that slowed Morty’s brain to mush.

The two flushed, writhing masses turned out to be a close-up shot of _torsos._ Morty realized it when a groping three fingered hand slid into view, ghosting over a navel and traveling north until it found its intended target; a lovely, fuchsia breast.

_Porn_. Jessica had put on _lesbian alien porn._

Two beautiful pink bodies - human-ish and very female – encircled each other on pale sheets, their mouths latched together in a slow, sensual kiss. Heat spiked in Morty, warring with the adrenaline response of panic, but the wet sound of their kissing and the low hum of groans wiped out the pounding of blood through her veins.

Doing her best to avoid turning her head and making it obvious – _sure_ she would die of mortification if Jessica caught her leering - Morty strained to see Jessica’s face out of the corner of her eye, the attempt made a little easier when Jessica leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. She looked thoughtful, eyebrows furrowed but eyes unblinking, the remote cradled loosely in her hand until she reached forward and set it on the table decisively.

So it wasn’t an accident that she’d settled on a very heated scene between two women. _Well_. What the actual fuck.

Morty’s imagination kicked into overdrive. Why had Jessica put on _lesbian porn_? Was that some kind of come-on? Was Morty supposed to make a move? Did she _want_ to make a move? _What the fuck was happening?_

“So, not to sound all ‘very special episode’-” Jessica broke through Morty’s silent panicking, “- but… how did you know you weren’t straight?”

Jessica turned then and cast her vibrant green eyes down on Morty, down into her very soul, and Morty nearly choked on her own spit.

“U - uh _what_?!” Had Morty ever told Jessica she wasn’t straight? Or was it just that obvious? And in all her time spent contemplating her sexuality, it had never occurred to her that she might one day be trying to explain it to _Jessica._ If she had known that, she might have prepared a little more.

“I mean, was there, like, a moment or something?” Jessica prompted when most of what came out of Morty’s mouth was stuttered consonants. Morty shook her head and turned enough so she could get a better look at the girl hovering over her, trying to gauge whether Jessica was making fun of her in some way or maybe recording Morty’s confession with her phone to post online and laugh over with Brad later.

But Jessica looked sincere - face open and soft in a way that nearly floored Morty. When was the last time someone asked her a question and waited for an answer _like that_? Like they would sit patiently until Morty had taken the time to put her thoughts together, genuinely interested in her response. It was unreal. “Wait, is that not okay to ask?” Jessica rushed to add, an amazing shade of pink coloring her cheeks. “I just – you don’t _have_ to answer…”

Feeling awful and put-on-the-spot, Morty hurried to respond, “No I – yeah, I’m probably pansexual...”

“Just like Rick,” Jessica supplied at the exact same time that Morty’s brain thought the words and this time she actually _did_ choke on her own spit, devolving ( _yet again_ ) into hacking coughs.

“Uh – y - yeah…” Morty finally managed to stammer out once she cleared her throat. But how the hell did Jessica know that? “You…?”

“I remember what you told me the last day of school, Morty.” _Uh, what_? That must have been robot-Morty. What the _fuck_ was she doing telling _Jessica_ things like that?! “And honestly, I meant to give you my number then but…” she shrugged, a faint blush painting her cheeks. “Anyways, what made you so sure you’re pan?” Jessica breathed, a spark lighting up her eyes, running a hand through her hair distractedly and Morty forced herself to smile even though she was officially freaking out.

“Oh, I - um –” Morty had never had this conversation out loud. She hadn’t _needed_ to. There was no one to have it with. Rick wasn’t a fan of labels so she had parsed out her own sexuality to her best guess. Not that she was anything but _Rick_ -sexual in actual experience but she couldn’t exactly say that to _Jessica_. Morty floundered for an explanation. “You know… with all the… space stuff…”

Like the brief flash of attraction she’d felt for the handsome Urganon who had wanted to lay his eggs inside her and kill Rick with a sword. Yeah, pansexual probably covered it. _Shit_ , robot-Morty really _was_ one step ahead of her.

“Oh, like that older guy from another dimension?” Morty froze. Of all the things Jessica could remember, why was it the time Morty almost accidentally confessed to having sex with Rick? Jessica plowed on, completely unaware of the way all the blood drained from Morty’s face, “Did he, like, have tentacles or something?”

That surprised a slightly hysterical laugh out of Morty. “What? No! No, he was humanoid for sure but - yeah, there’s a lot of stuff out there.” Like the beautiful pink-skinned aliens on TV that were inspiring impractically timed spikes of heat to pulse to her core. One of them was leaned over the other, teasing perfectly sculpted breasts, massaging them in her three-fingered hand, plucking and rolling the other woman’s nipples until they puckered into hard nubs. Gentle groans and breathy exhales filled the air from window to wall and Morty squirmed, uncomfortably aware of the wetness pooling between her legs despite her uncomfortableness, too aware that Jessica’s gaze was still locked on her face.

“But did you _always_ know that you were pan or…” Jessica shifted, turning a little more towards Morty, her bare knee brushing Morty’s clothed shoulder. “…did you find that out later after all the ‘space stuff’?”

Morty swallowed heavily. She didn’t really know she was pan until half a minute ago when Jessica suggested it and now she had to defend the standpoint. _Yeesh_. “I - well I guess I always thought I – I might be bi. For as long as I could remember, I liked girls and boys but...” She bit down hard on her lip to make extra sure the ‘ _mostly_ _it was_ _you_ ’ dying to ruin her life didn’t slip past her lips.

Because _Jessica_ was the first crush she ever had but the girl leaning above her _absolutely_ didn’t need to know that.

They were seven years old when Morty and Jessica were put in the same second grade class, their desks pushed next to each other for two months of confusion and hyper-fixation and a weird feeling in Morty’s stomach like snakes had nested inside and kept slithering all over each other.

At first Morty thought she only wanted to be friends – maybe even _best_ friends, the way people in movies and TV made it look so easy – but at some point the fantasies about hanging out on the playground involved holding hands. And then hugging. And then a seven-year-old’s idea of what kissing was; something chaste and artificial but sweet in its simplicity. And slowly Morty realized the way she thought about Jessica was closer to the way Summer would talk about the boys she liked when Morty eavesdropped on her sister’s phone conversations with the girl down the street.

And Morty knew vaguely that she was ‘ _supposed_ ’ to have crushes on boys, and in passing she sometimes did. Rem from the year ahead of her had nice hair. And Marcus picked her up once during recess to prove he could and the way he’d wrapped his arms around her waist had stuck with her for days.

But Jessica’s handwriting was loopy and neat and she doted her I’s with hearts. She knew the answer to every question when the teachers called on her but never seemed like a know-it-all. The pinch-vase pot she made in art came out the best out of everyone’s in the class. And she _always_ had something nice to say - would hand out compliments freely in a way Morty never knew anyone else to do, in a way that felt foreign and wonderful and _good_. Once Jessica even told Morty she had pretty eyes even though Morty knew well enough (even back then) that her brown eyes – too big and dark for her face – were absolutely nothing special. Not like Jessica’s sparkling emeralds.

She shook herself out of the memory, those green eyes boring into her still.

“Even when I was – I _always_ knew I liked both girls and boys. And then Rick moved in and…” oh, that was too close to something she shouldn’t hit upon with _Jessica_ (with _anyone_ ) so she swallowed the words that might follow.

Because _then Rick moved in_ and everything she thought she knew about herself (that she wanted to date Jessica and _make love_ for the first time on a picnic blanket in the woods and pick out a college together and maybe one day get married) was crushed flat by the monolith that was Rick. Now she wanted a pale hand tugging her hair, calloused fingertips squeezing her thighs, stubble against her cheek in the morning, kisses that tasted like whiskey and skin, the smell of burnt hair and adrenaline and the constant beating pulse of ‘ _I’m alive!_ _I’m alive!_ ’ lighting up every nerve ending in her body like she was a fucking circuit board – _jeez_ what had happened to her?

Morty’s fist clamped over her pendant through the thin fabric of her shirt while she tried to calm her racing heart. When her hand slithered up to the base of her throat and circled her neck, she violently ripped herself out of thoughts. “What - what about you, Jessica?” she forced out of her dry mouth, swallowing nothing but air.

Jessica shifted, scooting off the edge of the couch and dropping down next to Morty, her legs hugged against her chest. The tops of her thighs had freckles too. Morty _knew_ that, but she’d never seen them so close up before. “I guess I always thought… I mean society just _feeds_ you heteronormativity, right? So I always just assumed…” Morty was frozen in place, her breathing too loud in the brief silence of Jessica’s pause. “…But now Trisha keeps telling me about her new girlfriend (she’s bi, I think, or maybe just super horny) and - and Brad was so _mediocre_ , you know? And I guess lately I’ve been _curious_.”

Morty had to ask, she had to double check before her heart burst out of her fucking chest like an alien and she bled out all over Jessica’s nice white tennis outfit. Because what Jessica was saying was almost impossible and the fact she was saying it _to Morty_ was _absolutely absurd_. “C - curious about what?”

“About girls,” Jessica clarified, her voice steady even as she looked up at Morty through her long, dark eyelashes.

_Oh. Oh jeez. Oh fuck._

Was Morty having a heart attack? Or was she about to faint? Could you physically do both at the same time? It felt like she was about to find out.

“S – should we look at my h - homework,” Morty scrambled to say, her voice cracking in the middle, feeling dizzy and stupid and overwhelmed. Was this really happening? Had she really just _ruined_ it – _whatever the fuck_ it _was_ \- by bringing up her homework? Was she about to wake up in her bed (or worse _the bunker_ ) and realize this was all some fevered imagining her brain had cooked up in a wet dream/anxiety attack?

But Jessica smiled that calm, easy smile and laid a pale hand on Morty’s knee. “Morty, I’ve seen the way you look at me -”

“- oh no -”

“- and I guess I’ve been… _thinking_ about you a lot lately –”

“- _oh jeez_ –”

“- ever since you told me you liked girls too –” _fucking robot-Morty_ “- and I’m not trying to make you uncomfortable –”

“You’re not!” Morty rushed to insert even though, _jeezus_ was she ever.

“Oh good.” Jessica’s smile brightened and she tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear and Morty couldn’t stop looking at her mouth, shiny and pink and perfect. “Because I’ve been thinking about _kissing_ you a lot lately -”

The ground tilted and Morty threatened to tumble off into space but she dug her fingers into the carpet and held on like her life depended on it.

“- _ohhhh fuck -_ ”

The pair of sparkling green eyes drew closer and dimly Morty was aware of Jessica’s arm nudging at Morty’s shoulder, dipping the weight of the cushion as she leaned in and coyly breathed, “But if you aren’t interested –” practically into Morty’s ear, sending a jolt of heat and dread plummeting through her insides like an anchor.

“I - I am!” Morty’s mouth answered for her even though the rest of her hadn’t made up its mind. What if she had bad breath? What if she was a bad kisser? _What if Rick found out_?

But Jessica was getting closer and Morty had spent most of her life fantasizing about this and it was probably too late to push Jessica off her and rush upstairs to lock herself in her bedroom. “So it’s okay if we…?” Jessica trailed off and Morty felt the hot puff of air she exhaled against her mouth.

She _had_ to. She’d never forgive herself if she didn’t.

“… _Yeah_ …”

Then Jessica’s perfect face was leaning in closer to Morty and her stomach started doing a complicated gymnastic routine using her intestines in a ribbon dance and everything narrowed down to the light sheen of pale pink lip gloss coating Jessica’s cupid bow mouth, the smell of her sweet perfume, and the small, soft hand just barely touching Morty’s cheek.

The door to the garage slammed open and for half a second, Morty’s brain struggled to put together why that noise set off an adrenaline response so deeply engrained she nearly jumped to her feet but she caught herself at the last moment, stopping herself just in time before she inelegantly shoved Jessica off her.

And she knew – _she knew_ was going to happen before it did - knew those footsteps like she knew the beating of her own heart.

She was _so utterly fucked._

Sure enough, Rick’s rasp grated across her skin, raising goosebumps in its wake and plummeting her stomach all the way down to the earth's core.

“Wha- _auuuugh-_ t’s going on in here, _Moooorty_?”


	15. Chapter Fifteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a long one so buckle up!

Eyes closed, just a _breath_ away from Jessica’s lips, Morty _felt_ her lifespan shrink by ten years.

“You found some lesbo alien porn scene and decided to do a reenactment?” Rick’s sardonic voice drifted in from the kitchen doorway, wove through the room like poison gas, and flipped the switch on Morty’s animal brain.

She should run; she was so sure of it she felt it in her _soul_.

Morty peeled her sweating hand from Jessica’s shoulder and forced herself to open her eyes, _pleading_ that this was all some fucked up dream and not her terrible reality. But Jessica’s flushed face was still inches from hers, slowly turning back to the TV where the two alien women were still making wet, breathy noises in the absolute silence, fingers buried inside each other while they writhed.

Despite the absolute terror filling Morty to the brim, Jessica seemed only slightly awkward, like she got caught almost kissing people all the time, and for all Morty knew, she did. The person in front of her was a stranger standing on a beach a million miles away, waving at Morty while she drowned. Jessica didn’t _know_ – she _could never know_ \- and Morty had never felt more alone in her entire life.

“Hey Rick,” Jessica greeted, pulling herself together first and quirking her lips up into a shy smile, doing that hair-tuck thing again but somehow it didn’t have the same effect on Morty anymore, didn’t make her stomach flop over with nerves and excitement and want. It felt orchestrated – _performative_ \- and Morty felt as much of a connection with Jessica as she did the beautiful women still panting on the TV.

“ _Je-_ eeeuugh- _ssica_.” And to anyone else, Rick might sound neutral or maybe slightly annoyed but Morty could hear the hard fury lacing his words like he was screaming swears to the neighborhood from the master bedroom balcony.

But Jessica was totally oblivious to it, scooting back up onto the couch and self-consciously tugging at the hem of her skirt. “I was just helping Morty with her homework.”

Morty finally dared to turn her head enough to take in the hard line of Rick’s body in her peripheral vision. He was tilting a flask up to his lips, the faint smell of vodka hitting Morty’s nose and solidifying the moment.

This was really happening. _Oh jeez_ this was really happening.

She jerked her head back around. She couldn’t look at him - not yet. Not while Jessica was in the room. Her face would give everything away.

Rick’s hand landed on the back of the armchair – right above Morty’s discarded backpack - just at the edge of Morty’s vision, his fingers sinking into upholstery like claws. “Wha- _aauuugh-_ t? Getting ha- _aaaugh-_ nds on for sex ed?” He chuckled, a dark horrible sound like sparks crackling in a fire, and Jessica made the mistake of letting out a reciprocal giggle. Morty _felt_ when Rick zeroed his attention in on her, felt the weight of his aggression like a laser beam across the room, but didn’t have a second to hurry Jessica away or throw herself on the grenade.

“I didn’t think tits and vag where your thing, _Jessica_.” The scorn in his voice was unmistakable and Jessica flushed a darker shade of pink, biting down on the shiny plush of her lip. “Morty here would swap spit with anything willing but I figured _you_ had standards.”

“Rick -” Morty tried to stop him but she could tell – even from the corner of her eye – that something was off. He was too drunk or too angry or too _something_ , but she didn’t quite have the nerve to look him in the face and try to figure it out, all the excess space in her brain taken up by a panic so intense it was nearly blinding.

“Thought you liked the athletic type, Jessica. Or the _rich_ type. You want to be taken care of, not play babysitter.”

“ _Rick stop_ –” Morty pleaded again, hating the way Jessica had stiffened, her eyes going wide and glassy, almost wide enough for Morty to see the silhouette of Rick’s figure reflected against green.

Morty sensed the step Rick took towards her turned back – it thudded through the floorboards and crawled up her spine, rooting her in place like a rabbit before a fox. “ _Unlessssss_ ,” he dragged the word out thoughtfully and the room dropped five degrees, “you’re thinking Morty’s an easy target for a bit of experimentation. _Tha-_ aaaugh- _t_ would make sense.” His voice was shadow and darkness, electric fury and cold steel. Morty watched goosebumps raise on Jessica’s leg, even _her_ underdeveloped instincts enough to recognize a predator for what it was.

“Feels good, doesn’t it - being hero-worshiped? A real ego boost, isn’t it?” The words came fast and hard, a long string of them that cut Morty to the bone. “And she’s easy to string along, easy to use and then throw away because even if you’re feeling ‘ _curious_ ’ you’ll be back to dry humping boys in your car by August and _you know it_. You’re only after Morty to tongue-kiss enough to realistically brag about ‘your bisexual phase’ to the boys you’ll meet in college. In the meantime, you’ll ghost Morty and bitch to all your friends about how ‘ _creepy_ ’ and ‘ _obsessed_ ’ she is when she stares at you longingly between classes.”

Jessica looked stricken, eyes wide and round and gathering tears around the corners. And Morty wanted to say ‘ _shut up_ ’ or ‘ _what the fuck do you know, Rick?_ ’ but what was more realistic? That Jessica – perfect, beautiful, _way-out-of-Morty’s-league Jessica_ – actually somehow started having feelings for Morty or that Rick – who was always, _always_ right – had just hit the nail on the head.

And didn’t Kari and Trisha already whisper about Morty in the halls? Didn’t they cover their mouths and titter at her when they thought she wasn’t looking? Didn’t they give her a wide berth in the locker room and glare at her on the few occasions Morty raised her eyes high enough off the ground to make accidental eye-contact between rushing to trade her t-shirt with her gym jersey?

“I better get going, Morty,” Jessica said breathily, her voice wavering with emotion, but Morty couldn’t quite drag her eyes from the middle distance, too absorbed by the thoughts in her own head. “I don’t want to interrupt an adventure or whatever.”

“H - here I’ll –” come on Morty, _do something_ “- let me walk you out.”

The procession to the door was silent, Morty’s heart all bruised up just looking at the back of Jessica’s head as she hurried to make her escape, Rick’s heavier footfalls too close on Morty’s heels. Jessica struggled for a moment with the deadbolt then swung the door open, summer heat and sun slipping into the dark house and making Morty shiver.

“I – thanks for – coming over,” Morty mumbled lamely and Jessica spun, pinning on a forced smile and dragging Morty into a loose, stilted hug. Morty watched her purposely avoid looking at Rick who Morty could feel looming over her shoulder despite her steadfast refusal to turn around, watery green eyes locked on Morty’s face.

“See you, Morty,” Jessica said with false cheer, releasing Morty quickly and scurrying across the lawn to her car.

Morty would have watched her drive away - would have stood there with the door open, letting all the air-conditioned coolness out, maybe even for hours - except Rick’s fingers snagged into the belt loop at the base of her spine and tugged her back into the dim foyer, a long arm reaching out to slam the door closed.

“So- _ooough-_ meone’s in trouble,” Rick rasped into the shell of her ear and it snapped Morty out of shock like a slap to the face

“Rick, _what the hell_?” she finally spun, furious and heartbroken and ready to take it out on Rick. Except now that she was looking at him head on, now that she had worked up the nerve to meet his eyes where they glared at her from so close she could count the lines of his crow feet, they weren’t quite _right_. They should have been, on the surface they looked normal – electric blue and burning with intelligence – but her animal brain doubled down on the screaming command ‘ _run_ ’.

Rick watched the realization dawn on her face, his unibrow half quirking up like a challenge, an excited light brightening the eerie silver streaks in his eyes - in _both_ his eyes.

“ _Oh fuck_ –” she exhaled, finally coming unfrozen and yanking away from whatever version of Rick had just laid a heavy hand on her shoulder, ducking under his arm and careening into the dining room, scrabbling at the underside of the table, blindly feeling for the pistol Rick kept taped under the wood. But arms wrapped around her middle like a vice and lifted her off her feet before she could do anything more impressive than knock a chair over.

“Morty, calm the fuck down.” His mouth was on her ear again and she wanted to wipe the feeling (and the thin film of drool he’d left behind) away but her hands were too busy trying to pry his unmoving arms away from her stomach.

“Who are you?! Where’s _my_ Rick?!” She kicked and flailed in his arms, but her struggling didn’t falter his calm steps as he slowly carried her back into the living room. With renewed purpose (and a terror so big and intense it threatened to leave her breathless) she smashed her head back, slamming it into the imposter’s nose as hard as she could.

Her vision swam black as a sharp pain radiated out from the point of contact and she moaned, her struggling stilling while she paused to cradle her own skull. She’d head-butted a lot of creatures, sometimes even Rick (sometimes even on purpose, because he deserved it) and it wasn’t exactly a painless experience but it had never felt like she’d smashed her head against a rock before.

“You know who I am, Morty, _jeezus_ ,” and whoever he was sounded vaguely concerned – or well, the closest Rick usually got to concern – but that only added to the mystery. “Don’t brain yourself trying to head-butt a fucking robot.”

And with that one word, all the fight siphoned out of Morty in a gust. “You’re the robot-Rick,” she panted, the pain at the back of her head giving a mighty throb. Damn. She probably should have held on a little better to those wasted brain cells.

“Yup.” He popped the ‘p’, just like Rick always did.

“The one from the bunker.”

She could practically _hear_ him roll his eyes when he dragged out his answer with a burp, “Yu- _uuugh-_ p.”

“Oh.” She hadn’t thought much about them since she’d accidentally stumbled upon the robots in the bunker but then again, a lot of things had happened since then and most of the time her head really only had room for one thought. But now that she was once again face to face with one, she didn’t really know what to say to something that was _almost_ Rick but not quite. “Uh - wh – why -”

“- am I here?” His arms loosened around her middle but he landed his hands heavily on her shoulders and spun her around, shoving her over until her butt hit the coffee table with a dull _thud_. He glowered down at her with the _exact_ same glare Rick had practically patented and for no discernable reason, Morty chose _that_ moment to remember robot-Rick was hiding the same anatomy under his slightly bulging khakis.

If he was anything like her-Rick, he’d be sporting a halfie by now (assuming a robot version of Rick even _could_ pop a boner – could he? she’d have to ask Rick later…) because wrestling around with her always got him _excited_ and she purposely didn’t let herself dwell on what fueled her curiosity. Instead, she tried not to stare, jerking her eyes back up to his face and struggling to keep the flush off her cheeks but judging from the mean smirk just starting to tilt up his lips, he’d already caught her line of thought.

 _Great_. Even robot-Rick could read her mind.

“It seemed like you were about to do something stupid s- _ooough-_ o I got called in to stop you.”

Her distracting curiosity siphoned out of her like water sinking through sand. “Oh _jeez. Rick_ knows…” and it shouldn’t have surprised her - Rick knew _everything_ \- but _how_ did he know?! He was supposed to be away, portaling around the universe with mom, not spying on her _somehow_ and sending his robot to cock-block her once-in-a-lifetime chance at kissing Jessica.

But if he knew… _fuck_ if he _knew_ …

“You – you think he’s angry?” The half-quirked of robot-Rick’s unibrow answered her question. _Of course_ he was angry. And while she knew with terrifying clarity (the dim bunker flickered to life behind her eyes) that Rick’s anger couldn’t bode well for her future, she couldn’t deny the thick heat of anticipation in her throat making it hard to swallow.

“You just can’t leave a pretty girl alone, can you _Mooooorty_?” he growled, sinking onto the couch cushion in front of her and bracketing her legs with his knees.

And maybe Morty should have been mad (that almost-kiss with Jessica would certainly come back to haunt her later) but all she could think about was the hot slick of excitement spooling in her belly and the surreality of sitting across from the robot that Rick had designed.

It was _weird._ He looked _just_ like Rick - spoke just like him too, complete with mid-word belches and the long drag out of her name he so favored when he was trying to make her feel stupid. He plucked his flask from his breast pocket and took a sip, the move perfectly executed and indistinguishable from the way her-Rick habitually tilted back his portable stash of booze.

But on the other hand, it was so _not_ Rick she could feel it in her bones. He had all the right moving parts - all the crassness and wit and intelligence - but somehow it didn’t add up to the person who made her heart ache with wanting. He wasn’t _her_ -Rick.

For a moment, she tried to remember if this was what it was like talking to Rick before ( _before_ before), when Rick was only her estranged-and-mysterious-grandfather-turned-friend; an eccentric, unreliable man who dragged her out across the universe and showed her strange, wonderful things. Had she _ever_ sat across from him without the constant pain and unrelenting drag of yearning?

With a sort of fatalistic awe she realized no. No, she hadn’t.

She had _always_ wanted Rick, even before he held her against the wall and fingered her, before he painted her fingernails teal and called her _his_ , before he pressed their bodies together and made her feel complete, a sea of stars swirling over their heads.

That first night – the night that started everything, when he knocked on their door and sat at their dinner table and mom lit up like she hadn’t in years – even then. Ever since his blue eyes landed on her and a spark of surprise - of _delight_ \- sizzled in his eyes like Morty _surprised_ him (and even she could tell at a glance he was a hard man to surprise), she’d been desperate to chase after his heels. And that might have faded away, might have changed with time if he was a normal man – _a normal grandpa_ – and their relationship stuck to passing each other in the house and occasionally sharing mealtimes the same way she interacted with the rest of her family, but instead he snuck downstairs after everyone else went to sleep and made her hot chocolate and took her to that planet with all those glowing flowers, seemingly just because he thought she might think they were pretty.

No one had ever done something like that for her. No one ever made her a special secret late night snack, no one ever hung out with her, no one ever looked at her like he did – like she was full of secrets and he wanted to discover them all.

Even before she ached with wanting _all_ of him, she’d wanted a _part_ of him – his bright eyes watching her, his hand ruffling her hair, his constant, _endless_ rambling interspersed so frequently with her name. She’d been desperate for his attention since the moment he stepped across the threshold and looked at her – actually _really_ looked at her - and saw all the things her parents and her classmates and her teachers never bothered to see.

In her head, she’d always blamed Rick for them winding up the way they were, told herself she’d never thought about him like that until he _made_ her want him so bad it hurt, but now…

Jeez, had she been fucked from the very start?

She shook herself and honed back in on the android sitting across from her, his eyes raking over her, _processing_ , the weight of his gaze non-existent in comparison to her-Rick’s voltaic stare. What had he asked her? Something about pretty girls?

“I - I don’t know, it’s _Jessica_ ,” she mumbled, discombobulated by her strange revelation. Fuck, she knew she _loved_ Rick but she didn’t know the feeling stretched so deep – that she might have loved him from the _very start_. There really was no going back. “You didn’t have to be so _mean_ to her, you know.”

Robot-Rick scoffed. “Believe me, Morty, it’s for your own good.”

“And what do you – _what does Rick_ – want with me, anyway?” Because she had to know, now that her feelings were ballooning inside of her so big and intense, she had to know she wasn’t alone in this. And it was _shocking_ how easy it was to ask this strange version of Rick a question she’d _never_ be able to ask her-Rick if _he_ were the one sitting across from her. Hell, she’d barely even stuttered.

“Je- _eeeugh-_ ezus, you’re just as stupid as my Morty.” He rolled his eyes, but his annoyance didn’t burn the way it did when her-Rick brushed her off, didn’t crumple her up like wet tissue paper begging to be thrown away.

“Your Morty – _robot_ -Morty?” Was he just as possessive of robot-Morty as her-Rick was with her? Robot-Rick looked at her flatly. “Well… what do you want with _her_?”

“I want her to keep her fucking tongue in her mouth unless it’s in _mine_ , that’s one thing.” So that was a strong ‘ _yes_ ’ on the whole possessive thing. She almost laughed, something oddly grounding in his familiar behavior, until his words sank in fully.

“W - wait you guys – you guys _make-out_?”

“What part of ‘ _pe-_ eeeugh- _rfect replicas_ ’ do you not understand?”

That was… unexpected. Almost sweet. It didn’t make sense, there would be no practical purpose for them to be… involved… or whatever the fuck they were (or whatever the fuck she and Rick were that the robots were doing an imitation of in a life-size puppet show), but either _her-Rick_ programed them to fool around or there was something deeply moving to be said about their personalities and compatibility.

Either way, Morty found herself strangely elated.

Gushy words like ‘ _soul-mates_ ’ and ‘ _meant to be_ ’ zinged across her mind before she captured them and locked them down in the corner of her mind where they wouldn’t bother her so much.

Robot-Rick flipped over his wrist and checked his watch, eyebrow flat before he turned his head back up to Morty.

“And you can thank Morty-bot for _Jessica_ ’s supposed ‘inte- _eeuugh-_ rest’ in you.” And there was that tone again, disdain dripping from his voice when he said Jessica’s name. “Morty-bot got it in her head to be _friendly_ when she goes to school – or well, that’s her word for it. I’d call it flirting but – _uuuurp_ \- what the fuck do I know? Oh wait, everything.” And hearing the tone recreated by something Morty had less of an emotional attachment to gave her enough distance to realize it was _envy_ making Rick’s voice go so sarcastic and grumpy, stalling over Jessica’s name like a speedbump.

Rick was jealous.

 _Holy shit,_ Rick _was jealous._

Rick was possessive and greedy and controlling but she figured it had a lot less to do with _her as a person_ as much as it related to _her as a valuable tool to block his brainwaves_. That was why she figured he didn’t want her hurt or broken, why he got pissed when she went to school instead of going out with him on adventures, why he kept her so tightly wrapped around his fingers with mind-blowing orgasms and weird alien foods and just enough kindness sprinkled in to keep her grasping for more.

But if Rick was _jealous_ of a _teenage girl…_ that might mean…

Morty shook herself out of the cloud of euphoria that threatened to suffocate her when robot-Rick shifted forward, wrapping his fingers around her biceps. “Wait she – does robot-Morty have a –” it felt like a bad idea to say ‘ _crush_ ’ in front of any version of Rick, especially with her most recent discovery burning hot and magnificent in her stomach like molten steel. “- does she… with Jessica too?”

Robot-Rick shot her a cold glare and tugged her off the table until her knees hit carpet, bodily turning her so he curved over her back, her stomach pressed against the edge of the coffee table. “ _Perfect replica,_ Morty, shit, try to keep up.” Then he was pressing down between her shoulder blades, lowering her until her cheek pressed against wood.

And it was weird – the way she maybe should have been terrified, but somehow wasn’t at all. She trusted robot-Rick, trusted him the way she trusted her-Rick, maybe even more because this one probably couldn’t break her heart. But still, with her ass in the air and some iteration of Rick at her back, the organ finally got the memo to start pounding again. “Wha – what are you doing?”

Robot-Rick ran his palms down her spine, his fingers catching in the hem of her jeans, cold digits dipping below denim and easing it down. Morty felt a bizarre spike of embarrassment in a way she hadn’t felt for a while with her-Rick, not since she’d adjusted to his eyes sweeping over her naked body and taking inventory – adjusted to it as much as anyone could at least, when Rick’s eyes were as hot as an electrical fire. But this felt like that first time, when Rick had ordered her to bare herself to him, the command terrifying and exciting and so fucking dirty. She shivered at the memory just as much as the slide of cold fingers.

“Prepping you,” robot-Rick answered once he’d tugged her jeans down over the curve of her butt and started massaging the exposed skin. A thumb dipped along her crack, swiping over her asshole, and a burst of anxiety made her jerk upright, her elbows on the table.

“P – prepping me for _what_?” she demanded, trying to turn until one of robot-Rick’s hands landed between her shoulder blades again, pressing her down until she was pinned, his arm a steel bar keeping her in place.

The groping palm disappeared for a moment and Morty heard the rustle of fabric and the _pop_ of a bottle before something cool and wet slithered down her crack in a not-entirely-unfamiliar but currently-very-worrying way. “I’ve got plans for you, Morty,” he said darkly above her, a finger circling the rim of clenched muscle, and there was something about the way he said ‘ _I_ ’ that made her think the android wasn’t just talking about himself. “Trust me, you’ll want to re- _eeeugh-_ lax.”

Morty struggled to swallow with her mouth so suddenly dry and then he was pushing a finger inside of her against the firm resistance of her body, gentle and slow but unyielding.

It wasn’t like Morty was a stranger to the feel of Rick’s digits in her ass. One of Rick’s favorite thing to tell her was ‘everyone _likes a bit of a finger in their ass, Morty_ ’ with a dramatic eye-roll like it was the law of the fucking universe and begrudgingly she had to agree (though she hadn’t yet worked up the nerve to venture into that territory on _his_ body yet – she needed to work herself up to that). It added an extra sensation to the pleasure of his fingers or his cock buried in her cunt, made her feel like all the nerve endings in her body were centered around the space between her legs, packing her full up with almost _too much_ pleasure.

Plus, she knew Rick was after anal, pretty much from the start of… whatever they were, and while the idea scared her a little (even in porn women didn’t always look convincingly pleasured and she’d seen enough of the internet to know some men _actively reveled_ in their pain - _gross_ ), she was still curious.

Sometimes, in her darkest moments when she didn’t even trust her own thoughts, she wondered if she felt like she _had_ to stay open minded - had to give Rick anything he wanted - because if she didn’t, it would only lend him an excuse to find that pleasure elsewhere. And she’d rather let him talk her into something a bit outside her comfort zone than risk being boring and left behind.

And it wasn’t like he was discrete in his desire. He liked to watch plugs and toys disappear inside her, could spend hours riling her up, making her desperate, forcing her to beg him to touch her clit, to fill her pussy up, to do _something_ so she could cum, his eyes bright and manic and laser-locked on her. But those toys and his fingers were small in comparison to Rick’s cock.

But if anyone could make the experience pleasurable, it’d be Rick. This was the same man who made sneaking around the Plutonian _sewage processing_ _plant_ one of her favorite memories - he could probably make anal good.

Except for that one time…

He only tried to press himself in on one disastrous occasion shortly before the bunker – disastrous because he was a little too drunk and a little too hasty and he tried thrusting into her before he spent enough time stretching her open.

She straight up shrieked - the way she only ever did on adventures when they came across something terrifying even with her new warped scale of nightmare fodder - the sound embarrassing and uncontainable and too loud where it echoed back against the sound barrier. She tried to claw away from him, the urge instinctual - fueled by pain and fear and survival - but Rick’s arm around her waist was a vice and it held her in place, panic replacing the searing burn just long enough for Morty to know real and actual fear for the first time ever in Rick’s bed.

Between the surge of emotions and the stinging pain, her brain decided to trigger an immediate outburst of tears which she tried to stifle but the agony that had made her cry out so abruptly lingered in a dull ache after he eased his softened erection out gently. She was frozen under the weight of dread - like his dick had scraped open a shallow grave of tears and now they were flowing out of her completely unchecked.

Even as drunk as he was, Rick felt bad - his face going pale and serious as he gathered her into his arms and cradled her against his naked chest, whispering stammering platitudes that never quite included ‘ _I’m sorry_ ’ but were _almost_ close enough to contain the sentiment, eventually calming her down. Despite her pleading and reluctance, he gently fingered a weird glittering goop that smelled like licorice into her sensitive channel, soothing her the whole time, petting her trembling, sweaty skin while he called her a million sweet things that made her tear up for reasons beside the lessening burn inside her. Besides healing whatever had been damaged and easing the sting, it left her whole lower half numb for the rest of the night, a strange relief that eventually helped ease her off to sleep in his embrace.

And even though she thought he was blacked out – had figured he would forget the whole thing only for it to be added to the long list of memories Morty had to live with alone - he had cooked her an extravagant breakfast of stuffed French toast the next morning and let her pick what show to watch when he talked her into ditching school to spend all day on the couch with him and most notably, he gave her ass a decent break, cutting back on the fingers and the plugs ever since.

And she’d missed it sometimes, more than a little bit, but it was impossible to ignore the coil of fear in remembrance of that pain and the emotional ache that never really healed - the way she’d been sure ( _for just a second_ ) that Rick would keep going, would pound into her through her pain, would revel in her agony and the tears and the way she scrambled to pull away.

But Robot-Rick didn’t seem bothered by taking the time to let her body adjust, moving inside her teasingly slow. The sensation was still strange to her – especially after so long without it - so she tried to focus on his fingers, the way two thumbs hooked into the ring of muscle and spread her open, one dipping deeper occasionally and making the tight hole feel full.

“Do you –” Morty grunted slightly when the pressure became uncomfortable and robot-Rick eased back gently, “- you ever do this with your Morty?”

“Haven’t yet.” That growling, rasping voice was so Rick that if she closed her eyes and concentrated, she might be able to forget it wasn’t her-Rick behind her and lean into the moment, forgetting herself in sensation. But she had so many questions, _months_ of them built up, a desperate desire for explanations and answers and insights that she could _never_ ask for from her-Rick, not when keeping her in the dark was one of his favorite games to play. “Not that I haven’t thought about it. But we’re meant to do what you do and -”

“- it didn’t work out for us,” she answered for him, the memory extra fresh with robot-Rick’s finger slowly sinking deeper inside of her and making her empty cunt clench. “Rick wasn’t patient enough.”

“I’m plenty patient, _Moooorty_ ,” he groused bitterly, his hand sliding down her back until the artificially (but so realistically) calloused knuckles tucked under her shirt, dragging it up and resting palm down on her heated skin. “I jumped the gun a bit, okay? Give a guy a break.”

That sounded a lot like he was nearly admitting to making a mistake (or rather, that he was admitting that _her_ -Rick had made a mistake, her brain belatedly reminded her and her brow scrunched up in confusion) but Rick was physiologically incapable of accepting blame. The constant push inside her was just on the border of uncomfortable, the feeling of being filled so nearly familiar and yet utterly different. She squirmed under the press of his hand, hips rocking against the intrusion instinctively.

“I woulda thought Rick had a lot of practice with this.”

“ _I do_ ,” Rick insisted darkly and Morty exhaled a breathy pant that was almost a moan when she felt knuckles nestle against her dripping folds. He had one finger all the way in, the penetration deep and strange and _good_. Her muscles clenched around his digit and it was his turn to groan. “I _did_ ,” robot-Rick corrected himself, sounding reluctant and a little surprised he was admitting it. Morty strained to lift her hot face off the table, turning to peer over her shoulder at the way he was slack- jawed and focused on the place their bodies met. “It’s – _uuungh-_ it’s been a while.”

“Wha – yeah right. I’m not –” Morty had to break off to pant when his finger retreated, just a little, only to thrust back in gently, the friction nearly driving her mad. Her hands scrabbled at the wood beside her face, sliding up until she could clench the table edge in her hands for something to hold on to, forcing herself to _think_ , to _pay attention_. This might be her only opportunity to talk to robot-Rick, her only chance to find out what he’d be willing to share which was – _apparently_ – a whole lot more than the real Rick would ever let on. So she clenched her teeth, opened her heavy eyes, and breathed out through gritted teeth, “I know Rick gets around.”

“Do you know that, _Mooooorty_?” Dilated pupils rimmed with just the thinnest sliver of ice-blue cut up to her, the glare making her shiver while her knees rocked her body onto his finger, seemingly of their own will. She _had_ missed this. It felt good. Different but good.

“You – _he_ – tells me all the fucking time!” she asserted, nearly squeaking when his finger retracted only to be joined by another, the thicker stretch making her frown. “Men and women and – and tentacle monsters and crab people and – and everywhere in between. So don’t – why should I pretend that he’s _not_ chatting up some – some sexy college co-ed at this exact moment.”

And oh shit, was she going to cry? It kinda felt like she might. Then again that could just be the overwhelming feeling of two fingers sliding against her inner walls. She opened her mouth to gasp, but it might have come out closer to a sob.

“Okay, Morty, deep breaths,” robot-Rick soothed and she sucked in a lungful of hot air. Something brushed over her throbbing slit and the gasp morphed into a moan – the sound long and desperate and embarrassing if she thought too much about how it wasn’t _her_ -Rick watching her unravel. But even that embarrassment sent a shiver of heat to burst in her core and the arm on her back pressed down harder when she tried to follow the faint stimulation that _almost_ touched her clit.

And as if watching her come apart under his fingers inspired some unexpected honestly, robot-Rick ran his tongue over his teeth in a feral swipe and ground out, “I’m not, Morty,” like telling her caused him physical pain. He rolled his eyes and glared at her when he corrected himself. “ _He_ ’s not.”

The world shrank down to robot-Rick’s penetrating stare and the loud ragged panting she couldn’t slow down.

 _Jeez…_ did that mean… was it even possible that Rick –

She just always _assumed_ he was out sowing his wild oats with someone else on the few nights he didn’t tackle her into the sheets or the long days spent chaste in the bunker. She didn’t let herself think about it too often – it hurt way too much – but she wasn’t _delusional._ He wasn’t the type to abstain from his vices and _sex_ was most definitely one of them. But maybe…

When her eyes unfuzzed from the place her mind had wandered, robot-Rick was glaring down at her calculatingly. “Don’t tell Morty-bot I said that, if she knows I - it’ll just go straight to her stupid head.”

She barely heard him over the slowly dawning epiphany slicing through her with the force of a laser blast. “ _Oh woah_ …”

“Ugh, and of course it’s going straight to yours,” he growled, rolling his eyes again, his fingers stroking into her torturously slow. “Don’t get all _sentimental_ or whatever, Morty. Before U-694 I fucked my way across the goddamn multiverse, okay?”

The two fingers inside her twisted, the pressure and sensation and _pleasure_ ripping her self-control to shreds. “And since?” she panted, needing to know, fearless to ask, too full and too empty and too awed to reel her questions in.

Robot-Rick’s fingers stilled for just a moment. Morty’s desperate keen broke him out of his brief stupor and his fingers thrust in deep enough that his knuckles nudged teasingly at her fold with every stroke. His voice was flat and heavy when he finally told her, “He’d beat my head in with a crowbar if I answered that.”

Morty turned her face and pressed her sweaty forehead against the wood of the table, hiding the teary smile threatening to consume her face.

If robot-Rick was telling the truth ( _please god let him be telling the truth_ ) maybe Rick _hadn’t_ been sharing that too-open, too-vulnerable, too- _Rick_ O-face to every willing creature in the multiverse. The slick roots of possessiveness she didn’t dare acknowledge growing in the darkest pits of her stomach wound deeper into her core, rubbed against the two fingers buried inside her, and coiled around her heart in a tangled snarl.

That look was _hers_ now. A part of Rick - however small and insignificant it might seem compared to what she wanted from him – was _hers._ And jeez, she wanted it to be hers _forever_.

She was jerked out of her ruminations by a third finger joining the other two already prying her open, the extra stretch intense but not untenable now that her muscles had learned to relax. “W - will robot-Morty be jealous of – of this?”

Robot-Rick’s scoff turned into a heavy pant when Morty groaned at the new wider invasion. “Would you be, Morty? If your Rick fucked my Morty?”

“Yes,” she breathed immediately. _God yes_ she would be. It would kill her, it would literally make her insane. Make her do something crazy. But she’d still forgive him. _Of course_ she’d forgive him. Was there even any alternative?

“Then _yeah_ , she will be,” he breathed, driving his fingers into her so deep she felt his thumb toy at her dripping slit, rubbing _just shy_ of her swollen clit. “But she gets it. Can’t disobey a direct order, even if I wanted to.”

“ _Fuck_ , t - tell me about it,” Morty grunted, renewing her grip on the edge of the table and bracing herself to better withstand his oh-so-gentle thrusting. Robot-Rick actually huffed out a laugh at that and she felt weirdly proud to hear the sound, though it was still a shade of what it would be if she had made _her_ -Rick laugh. “But do you? W – want to disobey?”

“You’re not bad. But you’re not _my_ Morty.” And there was no reason for that statement to bolster her up like a fucking air balloon but it did. It did because if robot-Rick felt that way – and Rick had programmed him to be as much like _him_ as possible – that meant it might not be so far off from how _her-_ Rick felt about her.

Her forehead slammed into the table when the sudden dizziness of all her convoluted thinking became too much for her to stand while the overwhelming sensory input of being stretched open caught up to her. She hadn’t properly taken a breath since she’d been bent over the table and she needed a moment to regulate her breathing while her heart threatened to pound out of her chest.

Maybe it was wishful thinking. Maybe she was only hearing what she _wanted_ to hear (so _so_ desperately). Maybe robot-Rick was a less-perfect replica than either of them could own to and his feelings were his and his alone.

But maybe she’d stumbled upon another strange, unexpected display of Rick’s genuine emotions, the ones he tried so hard to pretend he didn’t have. And jeez, she could read between the lines – could let her heart believe the things that kept it from shattering, could let herself cling for _just a minute_ to the idea that maybe… _maybe_ …

The swirling whoosh of a portal opening up made Morty clench around the fingers buried inside her so tight robot-Rick hissed in an imitation of pain, her first all-consuming thought screaming ‘ _OH NO, MOM’S HOME_ ’ so loud she jerked to her elbows.

She could only imagine what she looked like, bent over the coffee table, pants around her knees, shirt bunched up around her ribs, robot-Rick’s fingered buried nearly knuckle deep into her ass. Her cheeks were _flaming_ hot, so hot she half expected she could set the table on fire if she laid her face against it, and her eyes were wide enough to pop. She was debased, utterly wanton, letting someone that looked like her grandfather push her down in the middle of the living room and play her body like an instrument.

The crippling embarrassment sent a velvety lick of warmth to the base of her stomach and she moaned, the sound lewd and awful and _so_ poorly timed.

But only Rick – _her_ -Rick – stepped out into the living room before the portal irised closed. Huge and all-encompassing, he strode into the room like he owned it - like there was no place he _didn’t_ own - glaring at her with something like anger but _so_ much hotter.

And her desperate, relieved sigh that bordered on a moan was cut abruptly short when terror seized her a second time.

“W – where’s mom?!”

Because what if Rick had gotten sick of mom and dumped her somewhere, like he did with dad? What if she’d gotten hurt – _what if she’d gotten killed_? Or what if mom had _decided_ to stay away, to leave and never come back, to finally drop the thin façade of a suburban mom that she just barely held on to by an unraveling thread?

And why – _why_ – was Morty such an awful, terrible daughter that the possibility that mom might not be coming back was almost – just a _tiny little bit_ – a strange relief?

“ _Relax,_ Morty,” her-Rick scoffed, two bright eyes fixed on her like she was the only thing in the universe worth looking at – the right eye (only the right eye) glinting with that thin line of silver, molten with lust as he drank up her embarrassing position and red flushed cheeks. And it was amazing what he had trained her body to do, the way his scathing command – half-sarcastic as it was – still forced her taught body to unclench.

And it was unmistakably her-Rick, she could feel it in the sizzle that traveled across the exposed skin of her back as he raked his gaze across her, lighting up every nerve ending in her body. The air in the room turned thick with static, the taste of electricity teasing at the tongue that darted out to wet her dry lips, his blown black pupils dropping to follow the path it traced with interest.

“ _Rick_ –” Morty breathed but she had no idea what she was asking for.

“She’s spending the night out, Morty,” her-Rick answered, his voice soft and dark and sultry, just as the android at her back gave a particularly pointed twist to his fingers, reminding her of his presence (as if she could ever forget).

Rick seemingly noticed the shift and sent a smirk to his doppelganger – one that didn’t come close to reaching his eyes – crossing his arms and leaning back, absorbing the scene with a calculating glare.

Robot-Rick barely – _just barely_ – nudged at the swollen nub of her clit and Morty gasped, struggling to keep her mind on track, her fingers uselessly scrabbling against wood.

Mom was staying out. Mom had spent the day with Rick in space and now she was spending the night _out._

“Wha – is she okay?” It was hard to concentrate when 90% of her brain was focused on the dripping heat between her legs and the three fingers stuffing her full to bursting but she had to check, had to make sure.

“She’s ho- _ooough-_ oking up, Morty,” her-Rick answered like it should have been obvious and maybe it would have been to other people but the shock still rang through Morty like a guitar string snapping.

It shouldn’t have been hard to believe – that her mother might be interested in casual sex – but she’d had an easier time accepting the idea that dad had been missing for nearly half a year and not once had anyone spoken his name except for Rick just the day before.

And even though the logical part of Morty _knew_ that mom must have probably moved on, she had never imagined mom _with_ someone else. It made her feel small and young and unbearably naïve, and shame might have rushed to fill the strange emptiness inside of her if it weren’t for the three fingers taking up every spare bit of space.

And – and how would mom get home? What was she going to do if she needed to bail unexpectedly? She could be anywhere in the multiverse? Was she safe? Was she drunk? Was she _too_ drunk to give consent? Was the guy she with secretly a mass-murderer or a rapist or a human-eating alien? Had Rick thought about _any_ of this before he shot a portal home and left mom utterly helpless and alone _in space_?

“D – d –” she stammered, too many questions trying burst out of her mouth at once.

Her-Rick rolled his eyes and paced to the front of the coffee table, kneeling down and catching her cheek up in his wide palm. “She’s _fine_ , Morty. You think – what you think I’m gonna leave Beth with some maniac? He’s fucking _vanilla_ , Morty –” robot-Rick punctuated the statement by twisting his fingers and sending a spiral of stunning overstimulation rocketing through her entire body “- but she needed to fucking _unwind._ ” That was admittedly hard to argue with. “She’ll text when she’s done and I’ll pick her up. _Okay_?” he asked, his voice thick with sarcasm, but Morty was too focused on the fingers slowly thrusting into her to properly resent the tone.

“Okay,” she whimpered, her face twisting up with pleasure overload, enjoying the too-stretched feeling a thousand times more now that Rick was watching, his breathing growing rough in the late afternoon silence, his fascinated face brightly lit by the sunlight streaming in through the living room window.

And suddenly she remembered why she was here, why she was bent over a table with robot-Rick smoothing a perfectly artificial hand over the globes of her ass, massaging her inside and out. So much had happened, how had she forgotten?

 _Jessica_.

“Rick, I –” she choked out on an exhale, determined to apologize or tell him off or beg him to press a thumb to clit and let her explode, she didn’t know which anymore, it was too hard to think with so many fingers winding her up with no hope of release.

“You have to stop worrying, buddy,” he insisted, his rough voice soft as velvet as it dropped an octave, code-switching to something private, something toxic, something dark.

“Why don’t you _make_ her stop worrying,” robot-Rick growled, throwing himself into the conversation. Rick’s feral eyes flashed up to his doppelganger’s for half an instant before dropping back to Morty and she didn’t bother suppressing the whole-body shiver his excited, assessing look inspired.

“Not a bad idea.”

Then her-Rick’s cool fingers were sliding around to the back of her head, threading through her hair and gathering it in a fist. Her pleasure-fogged eyes barely caught his other hand jumping to his belt buckle even though it was inches from her face and the sound of his zipper buzzing spiked a pavlovian gush of wetness to drip down her thighs.

“ _Rick_ –” she hummed but before she could finish her thought – before she could _form_ her thought – his swollen erection bobbed in front of her face. Rick took the opportunity of her parted lips to slip his head into her mouth, the salty familiar taste of his skin and the wet bite of his precum making her tremble.

“ _Fuck_ , babe,” he rasped out, breathy and wrecked and so _so_ good. She wanted to make _him_ writhe with pleasure, she wanted to debase _him_ , wanted to make him loose his fucking mind, kneeling in the middle of the living room, just like she was. His wrecked sigh was a decent start. “That’s it, you can take it.”

And she did. She widened her jaw and braced herself up on her elbows for a better angle and relaxed her throat so when the wirey blue/grey hair nestled at the base of his cock tickled her nose, she didn’t gag.

It was unreal, feeling so stretched in two completely different places. She didn’t know what to focus on, the one place _desperate_ for attention achingly empty and untouched. She moaned, the sound muffled and distorted by her full mouth, and Rick’s hand in her hair tightened.

And then they were working in tandem - robot-Rick’s fingers thrusting into her at the same steady pace Rick pumped into her mouth – and Morty’s ability to concentrate was lost to the overwhelming sensation of being stuffed too full.

Morty’s head was spinning. Every breath smelled like Rick, the thick musk of his skin and his sweat and their sex. Her hands crawled up the table to his hips, bracing herself with the familiar jut of his sturdy bones against her palms, trying to ground herself before she passed out.

Rick grumbled something above her and it wasn’t until she missed the words that she realized she was making noises - breathy, desperate noises – as she wiggled and rocked and bucked her hips, robot-Rick’s hand practically bruising where it was settled in the middle of her back, her shirt fisted in his hand to hold her still.

“Look at me, Morty,” her-Rick demanded, and even though it was a struggle to open her eyes against the tide of stimulation, she did, blinking away watery tears, trying to hone in on the searing black holes of Rick eyes, ready to throw herself headfirst into her favorite void.

Instead, her eyes met the glinting black circle of her cellphone’s camera lens, the kitschy shutter noise breaking through her dazed mind like a bullet.

She made a noise of surprise, greatly quieted by the thick cock still running over her tongue and nudging at the back of her throat. Rick lowered the cell phone, just a fraction, just enough to make eye contact over her scuffed and damaged case, his pupils blown so wide he looked animalistic.

The fist in her hair tilted her head back, changed the angle of the his thrusting, the new position finally offering her the chance to hollow her cheeks and suck on his retreat, a groan ripping itself from Rick’s throat and traveling straight to Morty’s achingly empty cunt. The shutter clicked again, and she was embarrassed, mortified, humiliated – she hated pictures enough when she _wasn’t_ tonsils deep on her grandfather’s dick and bleary-eyed with lust – but the thick-tar of shame only helped set her on fire, especially with Rick’s black eyes locked on her like she was the only thing taking up space in his head.

“Think she’s ready?” Rick rasped, his voice hot desert sand whipping against her oversensitive skin.

“Should I give her a test run?” robot-Rick grunted behind her, his voice no less wrecked.

Black eyes left her face and it was like a tractor beam being shut off, Morty nearly wilting without his stare holding her up. “ _Don’t you fucking_ dare.”

Then the hand fisted in her shirt was hauling her upright off the table, pulling her off Rick’s cock with a wet _pop_ while Rick shoved the coffee table away in a frenzy, clearing the path to her, wood slamming against wood when it collided with the edge of the TV stand.

“On the couch. You get to watch.”

Morty’s tried to make sense of that command through her delirium until the hand fisting her shirt loosened, her body crumpling forward without the support, barely catching herself on hands and knees before her forehead touched the carpet. When robot-Rick slowly eased his fingers out of her stretched hole, she groaned, the sound long and dragged out until the space inside of her that had felt too full made the unbearable swap to being too empty.

Morty gave into the urge to collapse, her locked legs still holding her butt in the air as she pressed her face to the living room carpet, practically in child’s pose as she tried to catch her breath.

“I’ve got you, Morty,” Rick – _her-Rick_ – murmured, wrapping an arm around her waist and tugging her until she was perpendicular with the couch, the new angle making it clear who Rick had been speaking to when he ordered ‘ _you get to watch_ ’. Robot-Rick looked haughty as he leaned back against the cushions, almost relaxed and curious except for his tightly bunched, white knuckled fists and the tiny burning ember of hatred glimmering in the blacks of his eyes. Apparently robot-Rick didn’t like taking orders any more than her-Rick did, but he followed them all the same. Still, she could only imagine the way it must be twisting him up, powerless except to obey, so unlike Rick to abide by anyone’s command.

Morty had no idea why that line of thought twisted a double edged knife of sympathy and arousal in her heaving back but even synthetic, his eyes held her steady as she gasped through the warmth. Or maybe it was the way his slacks still tented in his lap, despite the animosity burning furiously in the depths of his glare.

Her-Rick drew her attention back to him, cool hands sliding over the skin of her upward facing rump, tracing light patterns with his fingertips up her flanks, dancing over her ribcage and sending shivers up her spine. “Let me feel you, Morty,” he practically begged – the closest thing to begging she’d ever heard him get – and his lips touched her hip before she felt the drag of teeth along her skin.

And she was so lost to hyper-sensitivity, so floored by the gentle, pleading tones of his voice, so enraptured by robot-Rick’s silver glare, that she whispered, “ _Rick_ ,” into the carpet, her throat deliciously sore from his dick.

Rick accepted his name for the consent she didn’t have the nerve to speak aloud and then _his_ fingers were pressing into the space that had only barely adjusted to being empty again and even though it should have been exactly the same – the same thin dexterous fingers with the same callouses and scars - knowing it was _her_ -Rick made all the difference in the world.

The sound he made when he sank three of his fingers past her loosened muscles _gutted_ her. He groaned like he was dying, like he’d been shot through the stomach, like all the air was punched out of him in one brutal hit. She moaned in tandem, unable to quiet herself, unable to tear herself away from robot-Rick’s almost-perfect imitation of Rick’s electric stare.

“Oh bud, I’m – Morty I’m gonna fill you up, buddy. I’m – I’ll make you feel so good this time, I swear,” and even though she was nearly boneless with overstimulation, she clenched up when she realized what Rick meant to do, what she should have _known_ he’d meant to do from the very start, the actual prospect of it sending a jolt of fear to every muscle in her body and making her clamp down hard around the digits buried inside her. “Shh shh, Morty, it’s okay. Don’t be scared, perfect girl. I’ll – I’ll be gentle this time.”

She couldn’t turn to see what kind of face her-Rick was making (though she was fairly sure she felt the wet/chapped press of a kiss against one of her upturned ass cheeks) but robot-Rick was staring at her steadily, the bulge in his lap giving a mighty twitch.

“Pr – promise, Rick?” she barely breathed, her lips brushing carpet.

Her faint words nearly sent Rick into a frenzy, she could feel the static in the air raising all the hair on her head as his excitement turned charged. “I promise, Morty, I’ll make it good, baby, so good.”

Then his fingers were retreating, hands groping and spreading her cheeks lewdly before something thick and live-wire hot nudged at her aching hole.

She tried not to brace herself, tried not to clench up, but some instinct, some muscle memory, tightened her up. “You’ve gotta – Morty you’ve gotta relax,” Rick’s ruined voice came from a great distance away, the heat of his cock sliding along her lubed up crack, nudging insistently against the bunched muscle baring him entrance. His hands massaged at her cheeks, at her hips, and the place in her lower back just starting to ache from the awkward ass-up position, his fingers slippery with lube as they ghosted over her skin.

And she was hot – too hot, burning up, about to set on fire. This was crazy. _This was insane_. An hour ago, she was sitting in this exact spot leaning in to kiss Jessica and now her face was on the floor while Rick threatened to split her open on his dick.

How – _how?!_ – did she keep winding up in these absurd situations? What had she done in her past life to deserve this? _What did she have to do to carry it over to the next one_?

It was robot-Rick who finally helped her relax, his molten gaze a steady weight locked on her face when he dropped one hand from where it had rested over the back of the couch and palmed his visible erection through the fabric of his khakis. The sight – unbearably erotic for reasons Morty couldn’t even begin to work out with so many of her brain cells off-line – melted the tension from every knot in her body, lust blinding her to discomfort and twisting every place her skin made contact with Rick into pleasure receptors.

Rick’s thick head slipped through the loosened ring of muscles and Morty breathed out a shocked, heady pant, lost over the noise of Rick letting loose an animalistic grunt more growl than moan. “ _Oh fuck Morty_ …” he rasped her name like a prayer and she was intoxicated – completely drunk off the sound of his pleasure and the breach where their bodies merged.

He was thicker than three fingers, that much was obvious immediately when the aching stretch started all over again, but between the absolutely destroyed moans he was making at her back and the way she’d never ever felt so close to him before - so deeply penetrated by him before - left her gasping so hard she couldn’t catch her breath.

“Fuck, you’re unbelievable Morty,” he grunted, and she had no idea how much of him was in her, it felt like all of him, it felt like too much, but somehow he was still pressing in, still getting deeper, his hips creeping closer and closer, the heat of him scalding where he was almost plastered against her skin. “ _Oh shit_ , you’re so tight Morty, so good. Let – let grandpa fill you up, buddy, let me take every part of you and make it mine.”

Oh and _that_ was exactly the kind of thing she needed to stay relaxed, the words squirming under her skin like worms and turning her to mush. And combined with her earlier revelation (robot-Rick’s eyes still on her face, his unibrow slightly quirked like he knew what she was thinking) – the possibility that he _hadn’t_ sought this out from someone else the moment she couldn’t provide it, the chance that she was maybe just a little more than the most convenient hole in his life, the ‘ _you’re not bad, but you’re not_ my _Morty_ ,’ the ‘ _my_ ’ spoken _exactly_ the way Rick always emphasized the word – like the idea was obvious, ancient, indisputable fact – Morty was spiraling out, lost in a sea of pleasure.

She knew the moment he bottomed out inside her - not because of the way his balls nudged against her aching, dripping slit teasingly, or the way the curve of his hips slotted against her butt like their skin would meld together everywhere they touched – but because he told her.

“I’m – _oh fuck_ , I’m all the way in, Morty. I’m – _oh god_ you’re squeezing me like a vice, Morty. It’s so good – _you’re_ so good, Morty.”

Her heart was pounding so hard she thought the organ might pop and she was relieved that she wouldn’t need to accommodate any more of him, even as the just-shy-of-painful stretch slowly eased into something different, something not quite as good as vaginal sex but still good, something _deeper_ , something all encompassing, something so intense she couldn’t escape from it.

And with a weird out-of-body step away, Morty blinked into a completely separate thought: Rick hadn’t been rough with her since that time in the bunker.

Unlike the last time he grew some sort of moral compass or decided to be purposely withholding or _whatever_ the fuck his motivations were after she got shot in the gut and they took a little hiatus from the occasional brutal pounding Morty loved, she hadn’t pressed the issue – maybe hadn’t even noticed the change, at least not consciously.

The hole that opened up inside her when he’d walked away and left her down in the bunker alone - when he’d left her bruised and hurting and _empty_ \- still hadn’t closed. She wasn’t sure it ever would. And so even though they’d both had to hide in a perfectly serviceable broom closet when he’d stolen a bucket of tokens from a blob alien at Blips and Chitz (and broom closets, bathroom stalls, and nasty back alleys all had a way of bringing out the beast in Rick) he’d only wrapped his arms around her a bit too tight when he licked into her mouth, his hands rough over her shirt where he fondled her breasts _almost_ too hard.

And even though she liked Rick when he was rough - loved the way he could erase everything from her head that wasn’t him when he used too many teeth, when he pinned her wrists above her head, when he slammed their hips together hard enough to make fleshy slaps echo unapologetically loud – she’d felt _fragile_ ever since the bunker. And Rick - despite his lack of empathy and his sociopathic tendencies and his general disregard for her feelings - must have picked up on that because he’d been handling her with a surprising amount of care.

Morty blinked back into the moment with a little snuffle she muffled with the carpet.

Despite everything, this was still gentle ( _just like he promised_ her brain reminded herself with a sticky whisper). But when Rick stilled - balls deep in her ass and curving over her back, arms wrapped around her waist like he wanted to pull her inside of him by osmosis alone – it felt a lot like the mind-numbing, all-encompassing, borderline-dissociative pleasure of rough sex but without the teeth or the bruises or slight twinges of pain. There was no room left in her head for her own thoughts, there was only Rick and the hot pants he was breathing against her neck and weight of him almost crushing her and his sturdy thighs bracketing her own and the steady, rhythmic heartbeat that wasn’t hers but that she could feel throbbing inside her all the same.

“Touch me, Rick,” she begged, aching and desperate and so fucking ready to cum but millions of miles away. Her hands scrabbled at his arms, trying to drag them lower, trying to urge his fingers to find the place radiating heat and wet and want between her legs, but he only chuckled and held onto her tighter.

“Not yet, Morty.”

When he slowly, carefully, _gently_ rocked his hips, stars burst behind Morty’s closed eyes. “ _Ooohhhhh shiiiit_ ,” he exhaled, the breath of it cool against the sweat coating her back. He uncurled himself from against her back, the shift of him inside her strange and startling, her gasps getting stuck in her throat.

“You – you ready, Morty? You ready for me?”

His hands smoothed over the sweaty skin of her back, coming to a stop at her hips, anchoring himself with a tight grip. She struggled up to her elbows, robot-Rick’s eyes too bright and feral to meet, hanging her head between her braced arms and closing herself off to everything but the way Rick felt inside her.

And she wasn’t ready, she’d _never_ be ready, she was _desperately_ ready.

“Y - yeah, Rick,” she said, and she tried to sound steady and sure, tried to convince herself, but her voice wavered over his name.

“That’s – that’s my good girl, Morty, my sweet thing.”

And then he was pulling out slowly, the slide a blessed relief, her body adjusting to its natural, unstretched state. She panted - completely exhausted, overwhelmed, euphoric – as the length of him almost slipped from her entirely.

She was unprepared for the wave of sensation that hit her like a semi-truck when he pushed back in. Still gentle, still slow, but now that her body was prepared for it, the heat of his skin stroking her from the inside sets off sparks in her stomach and across her skin, pleasure warring with overstimulation.

“You – that okay, Morty?” Rick demanded softly, hips rocking back again before she had decided whether the feeling was a good one or not.

“I – I don’t –” his inward thrust stole her voice but she didn’t know what words would have followed anyways.

“Does it hurt, Morty?” he asked, and his voice sounded so sincere, so serious, his hips stilling their long stroking thrusts to nudge shallow and soft.

Tears pooled in her eyes at his tone - at the foreign, earnest concern - at the way he leaned forward, one arm bracing himself next to her elbow so he could smear a line of kisses down her spine.

“It’s – Rick, it’s a lot,” she panted, her voice almost a whine. It was so hard to think, so hard to speak, the feeling of being indescribably full almost too much except it felt _right_ to let Rick fill up all the places inside her. “Keep – keep going.”

And she wasn’t sure _where_ that command came from but she meant it, meant it with all her body. She was going to see this through to completion, to get the full experience, and hopefully on the other end, she’d be able to tell whether she liked it or not.

The gut deep groan Rick pressed into her shoulder was worth her niggling sense of indecision and he resumed his slow, almost lazy thrusting, his free arm wrapping around her stomach, his hand inching lower in a way that drew every ounce of focus she could muster to the slide of his fingertips through her short cropped pubic hair.

When one of his fingers circled her clit, she nearly buckled, all the too-full feelings - all the stretch and ache and intensity - switching gears from maybe-painful to full-on-pleasure so fast it made her dizzy. She made a noise (she was distantly aware of it), some awful, animal gasp that would have embarrassed her if she could spare the brain cells, and then she was rocking back to meet his tender thrusting.

“That’s right, Morty,” Rick urged, and she could hear it in his voice, hear the cost of his restraint, the effort it was taking him to go slow, to let her adjust, to avoid making the same mistake he’d made last time they’d tried this. And it was like her heart was the part of her being stretched too full, being forced to make room for him, speared by Rick and all his hard edges and hidden softnesses and the strange awful perfect mix of contradictions that made him who he was.

Then a finger dipped inside her, into her dripping, yearning, _searing_ cunt, and she stopped thinking all together.

“Jeezus you’re so fucking hot, Morty, you’re fucking burning me up –” Rick choked and Morty moaned in response, completely unable to articulate her reeling thoughts.

 _This_ was good. The constant push/pull, the way his fingers worked in tandem with his dick, the way he pressed the heel of his thumb to her clit and rubbed. It was so much - maybe too much - but if she was going to black out, it would be from pleasure instead of pain.

“Get over here,” Rick growled, his voice harsh and commanding in comparison to the sweet way he’d been murmuring encouraging nonsense into the skin of her back, startling Morty from the black of her closed eyes.

“Wha –” she tried to say, confused and a little alarmed, her brain too fogged up to make sense of what was happening.

“No, shhh, come here, Morty,” he answered, his voice a whisper at her ear, the arm around her stomach hauling her up off her elbows, the shift of him inside her lighting sparks across the ceiling where she’d rolled her eyes.

He was maneuvering her, the hand not holding her up by the waist prodding at her thigh until she took the hint and lifted it, the jeans she’d forgotten about trapped around her ankles getting shoved and pulled at until her legs were free and bare. And she was confused - so confused - so overwhelmed again now that his fingers weren’t rubbing at her slit, that she didn’t realize what was happening until she felt her leg lifted again and something wide slotted between her spread knees.

She blinked her eyes open, shocked to discover Rick - fully clothed except for the place he’d rucked down his pants enough to expose his erection – laying below her, his hands clenching and unclenching into fists where they hovered a few inches off her thighs.

It took her longer than it should have to realize it was _robot-Rick_ below her, glaring up at her heatedly, while her-Rick ran his hands up her stomach, cupping and pinching and toying with her breasts, his cock still stuffing her from behind.

“I told you I’d fill you up,” Rick whispered darkly into her ear, her eyes still locked with robot-Rick’s, trying to read the constant scroll of conflicting emotions he kept carefully contained behind his blown out eyes. There was anger there, and frustration, but some of that was wiped over by an overwhelming amount of lust. “Morty, you’ll be so full of me you won’t be able to think of _anyone_ else.”

It was a little awkward – mostly cause her legs were limp and boneless, her knees aching from holding her up for so long – and every shift reminded her of the thick cock stretching her ass, but with minimal struggling, Rick managed to maneuver her over robot-Rick’s bouncing erection, the head of it nudging at her folds and bumping against her clit, driving her fucking wild.

“ _Rick_?” she breathed, a question she couldn’t find words to express, completely unsure who she was speaking to or what she wanted to know.

But it was the Rick below her, eyes boring through her like a laser, who finally settled his hands on her hips, who’s hard line of an eyebrow slowly softened _just slightly_ – just enough – and answered, “It’s okay, Morty.”

“Be a good girl for grandpa,” the Rick behind her whispered - _her-Rick_ , her brain belatedly reminded her. “Let me feel you, buddy.”

And it was bizarre, hearing his voice in her ear but looking down on him at the same time. Like he was speaking from inside her head – the idea not exactly uncommon for how often her most destructive thoughts made themselves known in his deep rasp. And when robot-Rick angled his cock just right and her-Rick started lowering her down on top of it, her ability to think, to understand, to process what was happening vanished with all the pomp and circumstance of a star exploding.

What started as familiar and wonderful morphed into something utterly new when it became clear the two dicks ( _two dicks?!_ ) inside her had to vie for space. When she started to squirm, started to whine long and low from the back of her throat, the feeling too much too much _too much_ , Rick (one of them) pinched down hard on her nipples and the other (maybe her’s?) twirled a finger over her clit and she came – violently, spastically, so hard her vision whited out and her soul left her body.

When she sucked in enough air to stave of passing out, she was completely seated on the Rick spread out below her, his face open and rapturous and molten hot with desire.

“Holy fuck, Morty,” Rick breathed into her ear. “I felt you cum. _I felt you_ , Morty.” He pulled out enough to push back in with staggering force, and if it weren’t for the Rick below reaching up and bracing her with his arms, she might have toppled over onto him. Then _he_ bucked his hips up with the same force and the warring sensations ripped a moan out of her that the neighbors could probably hear three houses over.

As if the sound of her pleasure was the final straw, they both set in with a frantic pace, one pushing in while the other pulled out, the constant tug, the push/pull in/out full/full _always so full_ feeling unraveling her to her barest bones.

She was losing it, she was actually going to lose her mind. She could barely see, could barely keep her eyes open, could only scrabble blindly to fist Rick’s hair while he licked up her neck and bit her shoulder and brace herself blindly with her fingers knotted in the hem of a sweater and held on for dear fucking life.

They were both whispering, rasping voices coming at her from all sides in stereo, “That’s it Morty.” “Take it, Morty.” “You’re _mine_ , Morty.” “So fucking perfect, Morty.” “No one else, Morty.” “Jessica couldn’t do _this_ , Morty.” “The two of us _forever_ , Morty.”

There were fingers in her mouth and she was sucking them and there were hands at her breasts, squeezing and someone was pulling her hair. Teeth scraped along the column of her throat as someone palmed her ass cheeks and a hand wrapped around the pendant at her throat like it was a leash. She stretched out her hands, seeking, grasping, begging, and thin fingers interlaced with hers.

All she could smell was their sex, all she could taste was his skin, all she could think was _Rick Rick Rick Rick Rick Rick Rick_.

She was lost in his current utterly, entirely, like she was caught in a rip tide, tugged back and forth, pulled under, small and pitiful and helpless against the force of nature that was Rick and the things he could do to her body, the things he could make her feel, the way he held her heart in his fist and _squeezed_.

And she should have been terrified and maybe she was just a little bit (just enough to make the overwhelming sensation input _thrilling_ overtop the _too much_ ) but she was the one who had dived off the cliff and sacrificed herself to the waters because she wanted to drown.

With a scream like she was dying - like she was being born - she came again, every muscle in her body clenching up, her back arching like she was being shocked with a live wire, her eyes clenched so tight the entire universe sparked to life on the backs of her eyelids.

Morty was there, drifting weightless through the space between stars.

And before her, the burning white spiral of a black hole opened up its gaping maw, pulling at her, sucking her in, reaching out invisible fingers to grab her and reel her in. But then the stars around her shifted, an image coming into focus, a constellation of connect-the-dots, and it wasn’t a black hole at all. It was Rick. And he opened his mouth and swallowed her whole.

When she came to, the first thing she saw was Rick’s prominent adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed. She was cradled in his lap where he sat on the floor, his legs crossed underneath her, his back against the couch.

“The- _eeeugh_ -ere she is,” he hummed quietly when her fist tightened where it already clenched his lab coat. She was indescribably sore and all her limbs felt heavy and the sunlight streaming through the living room window was orange-pink with sunset. How long had she been out?

“- ick?” she rasped, her throat sore and her mouth dry, coughing to clear her throat.

A hand came into focus holding the open lip of a water bottle to her lips. She raised her hand to take the offering but he still guided it to her mouth, tilting it back, the contents cool and refreshing.

Robot-Rick was nowhere in sight but she wasn’t exactly surprised – though she did find herself distantly worrying about him, now that she wasn’t so overloaded with tactile information.

He hadn’t really wanted to do… _that…_ with _her_ (‘ _double team her_ ’ her brain whispered feverishly, almost maniacally), but he had to follow Rick’s orders and jeezus, did that make her a rapist? She really hoped not. _Really_ really hoped not. But it might. Ugh, something else to fret over when she lay alone and awake in bed.

She was bare except for her t-shirt which had been tugged back into place, her crotch still wet and sticky with lube and probably Rick’s semen judging from the content way he kept stroking her back and petting her hair. She did feel… leakier than normal. So he had almost certainly cum inside her. The thought made her toes curl even though the rest of her was too completely beat to respond to the heat spooling in her core.

Rick tilted a bottle of dark liqueur to his own lips, and a waft of whiskey hit Morty’s nose, the smell woody and familiar and so very Rick that she almost felt like tearing up. She craned her neck back, trying to see his expression - to read his mood - and he propped up a knee so she had something to lean against, his face carefully blank as he swept his eyes over her features, clearly searching for something himself.

“Fe- _eeeugh-_ eling good, Morty?” he asked, his voice quiet and surprisingly soft.

“Y – yeah Rick,” she mumbled, her tongue heavy. _Everything_ was heavy. She had never been so tired in her entire life. “Fucking beat, though.”

Rick chuckled at that, bending his head down to kiss her clothed shoulder. “I be- _eeeeugh_ -t.”

With his lips against her t-shirt - their faces so close together she could count his eyelashes and make out the thin almost non-existent scar at his hairline - she felt like her heart might stop for how much she loved him. Him and his stupid face and the stupid dark circles under his eyes and his stupid unibrow and that stupid, entirely too honest, almost worried look clouding his gaze as he searched her eyes for something.

She gave into the urge to nudge her nose against his cheekbone, a needy little caress, and he turned his head until their noses slotted together. She sighed happily against his mouth before he pressed his lips against hers, gentle and coaxing and sweet. She wanted to curl up in his kiss, wanted to lay down in the sunspot on the floor like a cat and kiss and kiss and kiss until she fell asleep or passed out from lack of oxygen or fucking died.

Jeezus, had she really almost kissed Jessica? It was harder to imagine why she’d ever wanted to with Rick’s lips against hers, softly coaxing another hum from the back of her throat.

Sleepy and suddenly struck with an urge to _watch_ him kiss her, she slanted her eyes open, just a little bit, and she might have jerked back in surprise at the two huge crystal blue eyes staring back at her if she weren’t so bone-deep tired.

With his lips still against hers he whispered, “Only I can make you feel like this, Morty.” And the truth of his statement sank to pit of her stomach like dense fog.

“I – I know, Rick,” she told him and she meant it. She meant it so much she hated him for it. “ _Love you_ , Rick,” she murmured, pressing her face into his sweater and letting the coarse knit wool absorb the tears that pooled in her eyes, her chest too full of too many things.

A thick chuckle - almost a scoff – tinged with an edge of disbelief shook Rick’s chest and the arms around her tightened, chapped lips pressing against her forehead, a hand lifting to cradle her head by a grip at the base of her skull.

“ _Jeezus_ , Morty,” he said faintly, even his legs curling up around her tighter. “ _What did I ever do_ …”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Got so many wonderful comments, and I'm so grateful for all the kind people willing to take the time to write them! 
> 
> And to all you who guessed at the imminent threesome, thanks for being my smut comrades-in-arms!


	16. Chapter Sixteen

“You had _Jessica_ over?” a snide voice whispered in Morty’s ear and she jerked so hard that she practically toppled off the couch. She was already sputtering out a series of consonants in full panic when she realized it was _Summer_ clutching a stitch in her side and cackling, bracing herself against the back of the sofa and acting like Morty - with her suddenly racing heart, sweating palms, and the missing stomach she left sunk into the cushions - was the funniest fucking thing she ever saw.

Morty laid a hand over her sternum and breathed out a long sigh, feeling the frantic patter of her heart while Summer’s breathless chuckles died down. “I _didn’t_ – I mean, _I did_ \- but it’s not what you think,” she bit out fast in case anyone else was listening. She still wasn’t sure how Rick had found out about that – what inventions he used to spy on the house (or on her) when he was away - but she didn’t want to risk him hearing them talking about it.

Miraculously, he hadn’t directly called her out for having Jessica over the day before (besides the threesome which, if he was trying to _punish_ her, he’d been _way_ off mark) but that was a conversation she didn’t really want to have, especially now when she felt so fucking stupid for thinking she could get away with it.

_Of course_ Rick kept tabs on the house. He had a hidden turret over the front door authorized to shoot an _alarmingly_ lost list of people and aliens on sight. She should have known he’d have cameras or microphones or _a fucking robot version of himself_ around to keep an eye on things when he went out.

“ _Yeah, okay_ ,” Summer breathed out sarcastically with the last of her fading laughter, plopping down into the recliner with her legs kicked over the armrest.

Once Morty’s heartrate finally normalized, her hands no longer trembling with the instinctive blood reassignment of fight or flight, she rolled her eyes and dragged herself back onto the middle cushion, exhausted. “No really, Summer, we – it was just a – a study thing.”

Morty was too tired for this. Too tired for _everything_.

Her body still ached from yesterday’s exertions and even though Rick had practically spoon feed her dinner (more accurately, she’d blithely allowed him to poke pieces of orange chicken into her half-responsive mouth with chopsticks while he laughed his head off the entire time) and then he tucked her into his bed before the sky was fully dark, Morty may as well have blinked for how soon her alarm was going off and she had to wake up and get ready for summer school.

The original plan was to ignore the alarm – her arm already reaching out to shut it off and turn over, her half-asleep thought process deciding _recovering from a threesome_ qualified as a good enough excuse to take a personal day – but her brain was brutally derailed when she focused her bleary gaze on the lock screen and made unexpected eye contact with herself.

Because instead of the background picture she had set – the one of her laughing into Rick’s neck whil he flipped off the camera – she was instead staring down her own teary face as she embarrassingly sucked down Rick’s cock.

Morty had gone from almost completely asleep to heart-poundingly awake in record time, confusion and embarrassment pooling warm in her guts. She slapped her phone face-down on the bedspread and hid her face under a pillow, he cheeks burning. Was _that_ what she looked like to Rick when she… Flushed and wet-lipped, her mouth stretched to accommodate his impressive girth…

_Ooooooh jeez._

Against her better judgement, she stole another peek at the photo, the screen bright enough to burn the image into her eyes.

She wasn’t well-polished with waterproof makeup or sexily aloof like the girls she’d seen in porn. Hell, she looked weird in _normal_ pictures let alone… Her cheeks were splotchy pink with her own blush, her hair messy where his hand sank into her curls, drool and precum leaking out the corners of her mouth.

And her eyes – _fuck_ – she really gave herself away. Her own starry-eyed devotion stared her in the face, the memory of the moment making her palms start to sweat, a hot wire trailing down her spine and making her clench muscles too sore to be abused so soon.

Rick - probably responding to her poorly contained embarrased thrashing - turned and grunted in a mostly-asleep sort of way, a wiry arm stretching under the covers and wrapping around her middle instinctively.

Morty blew out a frustrated huff that ruffled her bangs, blinking slowly at the ceiling. The jack-ass must have set it as her phone background after she’d passed out, knowing full well it would send her spiraling into a minor existential crisis.

She fumed quietly, her anger enough motivation to pry Rick’s arm off. She didn’t want to go to class but considering the way his hand slid up her stomach and made itself way too familiar with her left breast, it was a safe to bet the soreness between her legs wouldn’t get a reprieve if she stayed anywhere within grabbing distance. Reluctantly, she rolled to her legs, the strained muscles announcing themselves all anew when she strode from the room.

With a few angry finger swipes, she re-set her background (opting for the generic cloud swirl that came free on her phone) and tucked the offending device into her backpack. Unfortunately, she couldn’t erase the _memory_ of the photo so easily and it lingered around the back of her mind in shameful, heat-inducing clarity.

It wasn’t long before she regretted the determination that sent her off to school but by the time she had dragged herself into the shower and walked through the already blistering heat to school, it was too late to change her mind.

As if the morning hadn’t started bad enough, the whole day turned out to be a new exercise in pain. She was stuck in that awful cycle of nodding off despite her best attempts to stave off sleep and then literally jerking awake, a routine that pretty much amounted to was torture. Hell, she’d _been_ tortured before and the broken fingers might have been a little easier to deal with (though technically that might have to do more with the nanobots that had rushed to dope her up and mend her breaks than Morty’s pain tolerance).

It didn’t help that she might have woken herself up from one half-dream with a lewd moan, her classmates uncomfortable laughter rousing her from a day-dreamed snapshot from the afternoon before – Rick below her, Rick behind her, Rick inside her, Rick _everywhere_. She was _pretty_ sure she hadn’t said his name but the painful slamming of her heart against her ribcage was convinced she’d given herself away until Mr. Goldenfold rolled his eyes and continued on with his lesson.

And it _especially_ didn’t help that she kept on brewing over what robot-Rick had said – the way he’d made it _sound_ like Rick hadn’t been with other people since he started fooling around with her. That weird haze of disbelief that kept trying to tip over into happiness was too conflicting for Morty to process without borderline hyperventilating and the middle of class wasn’t exactly the best timing for that.

Still, she couldn’t get it out of her head.

All his crazy exploits (all the orgies and aliens and intergalactic gang-bangs); the idea that those had been on hold since he’d come to _her_ dimension - since he’d walked into _her_ house, since he’d started focusing all that energy towards winding _her_ up and driving _her_ crazy – that had to be impossible, right? Because if it wasn’t then what they were doing - that had to _mean_ something… right?

_Maybe_.

Probably not, though.

She snorted loudly at her own stupidity and Mr. Goldenfold turned his apathetic glare towards her and demanded, “What’s so funny, Morty?”

“N – nothing,” she spit out, red-cheeked and mortified and hating herself more than usual.

Rick wasn’t the type of man to _love_ anyone. He didn’t even believe in the _idea_ of love and humoring the possibility ran the risk of scalding her to the bones. No, it was more likely that fucking his granddaughter was enough to satiate his perversions (enough to keep him from shooting his jizz all across the multiverse at least) and that alone was a massive relief she shouldn’t overlook just because it wasn’t _exactly_ what she wanted.

_Nobody_ got _exactly_ what they wanted. Especially not Morty.

The only upside to the day was that she managed to go to school and back _without_ running into Jessica. Thank _fucking_ god. She didn’t think she was quite ready to face her yet, not with the way robot-Rick had torn Jessica to shreds the day before, not with the way Morty was starting to think he had made a fair few points, and not with the swinging pendulum of regret that alternated between ‘ _I should have just kissed her_ ’ and ‘ _I never should have tried_ ’.

And she was way too tired to pretend she wasn’t all fucked up over it and depressingly aware that a little sleep would help level her emotions. But the universe was back to hating Morty and currently it seemed dead set on keeping her from regaining even the smallest fraction of her sanity by sending her sister – who was being unusually chatty in a way Morty would normally really appreciate – except all she could think at the moment was ‘ _please shut up and let me sleep_ ’.

Morty turned her head, studying the smug interruption disturbing her attempt to nap. When she got home from school, Morty had taken one look at the stairs and given up on the idea of making it to bed. She didn’t want to risk alerting Rick to her presence by crawling into his either – no matter how tempting that was – because he’d drag her off on another adventure just to punish her for going to class.

But now Summer was looking at her with a coy smile that kept setting off alarm bells in Morty’s head and she briefly wondered whether she had the energy to fend off her sister’s good-natured attempts at teasing or if she’d have better luck dragging herself upstairs and avoiding it entirely. But the couch was so soft and the low drone of Ball Fondlers was easing her into a half-doze and Morty was fairly sure her limbs had all gained fifty pounds.

“‘ _Studying_ ’,” Summer emphasized, sarcasm heavy in her voice. “ _Sure_.” Morty cracked an eye open to glare listlessly in her direction. “‘ _a² plus b² equals_ v _²,_ ’” Summer slack-jawed in a not-entirely bad imitation of Jessica’s Californian/upper class accent, splitting her fingers in front of her mouth and sticking her tongue through.

“R – real clever, Summer,” Morty grumbled, letting herself flop face first down onto the seat cushion and once again abandoning the thought of crawling out of the room.

“No, seriously,” Summer’s voice sounded by muffled under Morty’s groaning. “Morty, she was totally coming on to you.”

And Morty _very much_ resented that if she was a _normal_ kid, she could sit in her living room and ask her older sister for advice about the pretty girl that had almost kissed her the day before and _not_ worry about being spied on by her possessive grandfather slash …lover? (gross) _sexual partner_ … but as it was, it just wasn’t worth the risk.

“It’s not – It doesn’t really matter, Summer,” Morty mumbled into the cushion, closing her eyes and letting the tidal wave of tiredness wash over her again, determinedly pushing everything else to the back of her mind. The sunlight streaming through the window was cutting across her eyes so she buried her face against the fabric again and ignored the strain it was to breathe through rough linen and cushion stuffing. “How did you – where’d you hear that, anyways?” If she said Rick…

“Dierdre Michaels.” Morty might have rolled her eyes if she could open them. She couldn’t even _picture_ who Summer was talking about but apparently it wasn’t just Rick with his ear to the ground. “Morty, you’ve had a crush on Jessica since _grade school_. She drove you home and came up with some flimsy excuse to come inside. You’ve gotta make a move!”

“It’s not like – I could never _date_ _Jessica_ , Summer,” Morty’s mouth answered automatically and even she knew her voice was thick and dreamy. Her body was heavy, all her muscles relaxing with one deep exhale.

Talking to Jessica had been… something. Normal, almost. Maybe even nice. Was that what it was like, having a girl – a _friend_ \- her own age to talk to? And Jessica still smelled good even though she’d come from tennis practice or whatever and it was a hundred degrees outside. Her skin was pretty too, beautiful and clear and smooth… nothing like Rick’s – scarred and wrinkled and well worn. But Rick’s skin… she knew every mark on his body like it was her own, knew the taste of it on her tongue and the feel of it under her fingers…

“Why can’t you date Jessica?” Morty vaguely heard through her foggy ruminations, the words dragging Morty back from the edge of sleep. The question didn’t make sense. Why couldn’t she date Jessica again? _Oh yeah_.

“Rick wouldn’t li- _iiiii_ -ke it,” Morty answered, the words stretched out with a yawn. “He’d be jealous.” She didn’t _love_ when Rick was jealous (which he was, apparently, _all_ the time – she could see that now clear as day thanks to her conversation with robot-Rick) but she didn’t hate it either. It was another small hint that he might actually… he would never _say_ it but that didn’t mean he couldn’t _feel_ it…

“Why would Grandpa be jealous?” The words were loud to Morty who was _teetering_ over the ledge into sleep and she was sick of talking, sick of being awake, sick of that niggling spiral of apprehension that was starting to swirl behind her sternum.

“Rick –” she broke off again to yawn, “- he’d _lose his mind_ if I kissed someone else,” she mumbled, drifting away into sleep…

Then she realized what she had just admitted to.

Her eyes popped open, her body going from zero to _twelve_ as her heart literally _throbbed_ with the sudden inrush of anxiety. She scrambled up to her elbows in time to catch Summer’s wide-eyed, milk-pale expression of shock before she carefully schooled it into a look of real concern so sincere it nearly broke Morty’s heart.

“Morty, _does Rick_ –” Summer started and she already sounded dangerous, her voice growing sharp with anger, so Morty rushed to cut her off.

“N – n – n – no, Sum – Summer, I – I-” She cursed her stutter, all too aware of how much it gave her away. But her choppy attempts at a sentence were cut short when the sound of a portal whooshing open split the air in the space beside the couch.

The familiar feel of Rick’s fingers wrapping around her wrist and yanking her to her feet would almost have been reassuring if it weren’t for the flat look of rage turning all of his features sharp as steel. “Come on, Morty,” he bit out, shoving her through the green spiral. The last thing she saw of the living room was Summer rising to her feet, her eyes burning with a furious heat.

Morty slipped through the swirl of particles and fell back hard onto a metal floor, absorbing the landing painfully with her tailbone and staring horrified at the portal still hovering in front of her. She had half a moment to realize she was in the bunker (her heart sank uncomfortably to her stomach as an echoing chant in the back of her mind chorused ‘ _no no no no no no no no’_ ) before Rick stepped through, casually tucking something that looked an _awful_ lot like a gun into his pocket and striding past with heavy foot falls.

“R – R – Rick,” she desperately pleaded, struggling to her feet and rubbing at her sore lower back. “I – Rick I’m – I was half asleep - I didn’t mean-”

The last time someone walked in on them – the last time someone _found out_ …

Rick _wouldn’t_ … he couldn’t send Summer away, he just _couldn’t_. Unlike dad, Rick _liked_ her too much - Morty _knew_ he did; he thought she was funny, practically treated her like a protégé in some ways - so he wouldn’t just… get rid of her…

Would he?

She glanced at the pocket where something vaguely gun shaped had disappeared and prayed – honest to god _prayed_ – that he hadn’t just… because he _wouldn’t… Right?_

Rick cut her off with a hard look, his hand landing on a half drank bottle of dark liquor and swallowing three big gulps. And Morty hated herself all afresh when the authoritarian look of cold, righteous anger sent a ripple of heat down her spine that settled between her legs. God what was _wrong_ with her? Why was she programed to be _turned on_ by Rick’s mood swings? It didn’t make any sense but here she was, suddenly agonizingly aware of every nerve ending in her body as a rush of moisture leaked from her folds.

From the predatory sweep Rick’s eyes made over her, he knew what his stern glower was doing to her, knew how much she craved his angry commands. He’d been nothing but patient with her for weeks as she readjusted to life outside the bunker and it had been… nice in a certain way. Even the almost-kiss with Jessica hadn’t earned her any _real_ anger, even the anal-sex-turned-threeway had been gentle (as gentle as anal-sex-turned-threeway could get, Morty supposed), and it was novel, in a way, to uncover this new layer of Rick that was maybe kind and sort-of patient - but the secret terrible parts of her she’d rather just cut out had missed the stern voice, the harsh orders, and the hard line he drew in the sand demanding she pick his side.

She was so fucked up and so _so_ aroused.

“ _Morty_ ,” he growled, his voice rough and dark and dangerous. Morty barely suppressed a shiver. “Do you realize what you just did?”

“Does – does Summer-”

“‘ _Does Summer_ _know_ ’, Morty? Is that what you were going to ask?” He threw open a drawer and things clattered heavily inside. “Didn’t you just tell her?”

“R – R - Rick, _p - please_ –” she struggled to spit out but as always her stutter kept her thoughts trapped in her head.

“And who said I’ve ever been _jealous_ , huh?” He riffled through whatever tools had clanked together, his movements harsh. “I’m not some fucking lovesick teenager, Morty.” With a heavy hand, he slammed something thick and weighty down onto the counter and Morty sucked in a breath when she saw the familiar metal curve of the collar.

“N – n – n – no…” she was almost whimpering now, and she hated Rick and she hated that collar and most of all she hated herself. Hated how _bare_ her neck had felt ever since he’d taken it off her. Hated how her hands had dragged across that naked expanse of skin and tried to replicate the weight of it on her throat. Hated how the fear it spiked in her stomach was only rivaled by anticipation.

He glared at her as he kicked his chair out from under the desk, picked up a screwdriver and started tinkering with the metal band. “Kneel,” he commanded, pointing to the floor beside his chair and Morty lurched to follow the order, feeling lightheaded. She took her place at his side, the metal floor cold on her bare knees, the shorts she had worn to stave off the summer heat of the math classroom _hilariously_ inappropriate down in the bunker where it was always sterile and cold.

She’d barely been out of the bunker more days that she’d been in it and the memory was too fresh, his anger too much a terrifying unknown. She’d only _just_ re-acclimated back to her old self… she didn’t want to have to do all that over again.

Summer’s horrified face flashed behind her closed eyes (followed immediately by dad’s almost lax expression that slowly twisted into disgust, his face hauntingly lit by the blue light of TV static) and Morty drowned in self-recrimination. She _deserved_ that look, even if it had cut her to the bone.

When she opened her eyes, they clung to the collar like a magnet. She didn’t want to spend more time back in the bunker, but she _would_. She would if it meant she wouldn’t be condemning Summer to… whatever Rick had done with dad… which hopefully wasn’t… because _that_ would just be…

“R-Rick… _please_ don’t-” she started, willing to beg if it meant he might listen. He was breathing too slowly, his chest rising and falling with deep, even inhales like he was counting them out in his head. He glared at her out of the corner of his eyes as he lifted the bottle to his lips again. “I’m so sor-”

She was startled into silence when he yanked a drawer open on his other side. Things clattered together as his hand disappeared inside and then he growled, “O- _ooough-_ pen up.”

“- _Please don’t take Summer away_ ,” she rushed to say, using what might be her last opportunity to entreaty Rick for the one thing she couldn’t stand, the one thing that might _actually_ make her hate him enough to turn her against him for good. Her fingers clasped onto the cold shape of the topaz at her wrist as she waited, desperate and panting.

For just a fleeting second, his eyes squinted, his brow scrunching in a tiny micro-expression – not quite a flinch but not quite _not_ a flinch either – before he turned his full attention to her. She wasn’t sure if he could read her thoughts on her face or if it was the gravity of her finally getting a sentence out without stuttering but some of the rage drained from Rick’s eyes, the bottle stilling halfway to his lips as he surveyed her harried expression. “What would you do to make up for that sort of favor, Mo _-oough-_ rty,” he taunted darkly, taking another long drag of whiskey and Morty genuinely couldn’t tell whether he was only playing the villain or if he actually meant it.

“ _Anything, Rick_ ,” Morty promised with as much sincerity she could instill into the words, and his eyes flashed darkly again, cutting a searing hole right through her.

Desperate to keep him happy, she obeyed his last command and opened her mouth, a trickle of despicable excitement spooling in her core.

Rick tilted his head, his eyes raking over her and leaving her gutted, her stomach unbearably warring with itself over whether it should be tied in knots of fear or wound up in excitement. When the hard edge of his jaw relented, she breathed out a silent sigh of relief.

Morty wasn’t surprised when Rick one-handedly pressed something into her mouth; she had been expecting it - maybe even _craving_ it - but it wasn’t any of the various things she had grown used to being gagged with. It was smooth and almost rubbery but it had a lot of give, squishing between her teeth as Rick purposely packed it in as deeply as it would go, arranging it carefully in her mouth. Her hands found their way to his thigh, fisting the fabric of his pants as his digits retracted to trace her lips.

She moaned inadvertently and Rick’s eyebrow quirked in a knowing, smug kind of way. When he was satisfied with its placement, he pressed it solidly right between where her teeth couldn’t quite close around it and it made a disconcerting _click_.

Then the thing in her mouth was growing, expanding, prying her teeth apart and pushing against her cheeks, finding all the space in her mouth and filling it up. The earlier give was gone, replaced by a firm, unmalleable packing custom shaped to her mouth, the back of it teasing just close enough to her throat to hint at discomfort - to just _barely_ begin to hinder her breathing - and she exhaled a rasping gasp through her nose.

A somewhat frantic whine was muffled to almost non-existence, the sound humming from the back of her throat as her mouth was completely sealed off, no words escaping the gag stuffing her full. It was unimaginably restrictive, the most completely she’d ever been silenced, and the traitorous throbbing between her legs was so intense her knees nearly buckled.

Her fingers jumped to her mouth, trying to feel out what was between her teeth, trying to loosen it since her tongue was uselessly pressed to the bottom of her mouth and too trapped to fight the intrusion. But whatever it was had grown so much it was too big for her to spit out, too huge to fit back out between her lips without deflating, sealing itself inescapably inside her mouth.

“Hands off, Mo- _ooough_ -orty,” Rick demanded, catching one of her wrists in his grip. He was watching her with the kind of fascination he usually reserved for his more ambitious experiments or a particularly graphic bit of violence and his attention (as always) sent shivers of need down her spine. “Or do you want the cuffs?”

He was threatening her - she was sure that was supposed to be his intention - but something must have shown on her face because the anger coiling his brow melted into intrigue and he spun on his seat to face her more fully, catching her face between his two large palms and huffing out a groan that raised the hair on her arms.

“My fucking pervert. You do, don’t you, Morty? You _want_ to be helpless at grandpa’s feet.”

Her vision was extra watery but she didn’t have the will to lie by shaking her head, and the soft, almost adoring heat that blew out his pupils was worth the hit to her long-ago forsaken ego.

Rick leaned down to a knee behind her and he was gentle when he pulled her hands away from her face – then again, she let herself be guided with no resistance and he always had it in him to be benevolent when she was throwing herself at his mercy. She didn’t think too hard about the fact that he had been carrying cuffs in his lab coat pocket and instead relished the _snick_ of the latches catching around her wrist, that tiny vibration traveling up her arms, down her heaving chest and straight to her throbbing clit.

“I’ll be e- _eeegh-_ xtra nice since you wanted it so bad, buddy,” her murmured behind her and she wasn’t sure what he meant until she felt metal circle her ankles, just above her Keds. She tried to peer over her shoulder but Rick’s torso was in the way, his nimble fingers making quick work of shackling her legs together, her knees spreading to accommodate the new, forced positon; ankles together.

He smoothed his calloused palms down her arms and bit her shoulder through her shirt. “There. That’s better, isn’t it Morty?” She tugged at her arms and found he’d connected her wrist cuffs to her ankles, a short chain keeping her hands back and pulled down, removing the possibility of getting up off her knees.

She tried to moan in response but the sound was so muffled by the strange gag it was hardly more than a wheeze. He chuckled darkly into her hair and threw himself back onto his chair. The glance he cut her out of the corner of his eyes was scorching and Morty clenched her thighs seeking friction.

When Rick turned back to the collar and the screwdriver and whatever else Morty was going to be forced to endure, she sank back into her own thoughts, breathing heavily through her nose.

Being bound by Rick was freeing in a way she was still trying to come to terms with when all her instincts, rationality, and personal beliefs firmly insisted she must be broken to feel so secure when she was tightly trapped under his power.  

But sometimes it felt like the only way to let go, to take a back seat, to hand over the reins to a higher existence – and in all the multiverse there was no higher existence than _Rick_.

With her hands behind her back, she couldn’t touch anything she wasn’t supposed to. With her mouth stuffed full, she couldn’t say something stupid. Tied up at Rick’s knee, she _couldn’t possibly_ fuck up – that option had been removed from the equation – and since so much of her time was spent fumbling around and messing shit up, it was a relief to simply _be_ where she was put and stay until Rick allowed her otherwise.

She didn’t think she had always been like that. Sure, before Rick had knocked on the door she’d been _aware_ of bondage and shit like that – the internet was a wonderful place and Morty happened to _really_ like porn – hell, she’d even rubbed one out to some fairly tame videos of girls with their wrists tied loosely in front of them while their boyfriends railed them from behind.

But Rick was on a whole different level; he made submitting _easy_. Not just sexually, either, but in _every_ aspect of their relationship. When he snapped out an order mid-adventure, failure to act on it could mean death. So if he said ‘ _cover me_ ’ or ‘ _duck_ ’ or ‘ _get on my shoulders_ ’, it was usually best to just listen.

And beyond that…

Morty shifted her knees further apart, her thighs clenching and seeking friction, her wrists tugging just to feel the pull of the chain keeping her docile…

Beyond how easy it was and how at peace it made her feel, there was another more sinister edge that Morty tried not to think about too long but always inadvertently sprang up in the back of her mind when she found herself bound, Rick looming over her huge and unavoidable.

When he tied her up – when he locked her wrists behind her back and chained her down and buckled a gag between her lips – he took away her ability to deny consent. Held down and overpowered, it wasn’t up to _her_ to stop her grandfather from licking between her folds, it wasn’t _her_ choice to be stuffed so full of an old man’s cock she thought she’d feel the burn of it for days, she didn’t have to feel _conflicted_ over the fact that Rick knew her body better than she knew herself.

The low level guilt and self-disgust that never quite washed away in the shower could be pushed to the backburner because, tied up and maneuvered where he wanted her, she had zero culpability.

And mentally that really lightened the load. Because it wasn’t like she _could_ stop him if she weren’t bound and gagged; not that she’d want to stop him anyways – he made her feel wanted and cared for and _known_ – and she _loved_ him even if sometimes it was like loving a rabid dog. But when he took control and when she gave it up, that little niggling voice that whispered ‘ _don’t do it, he scares you_ ’ in the back of her head was simultaneously validated and silenced.

Plus, she wasn’t so insane as to not realize – to not _know_ – that what her and Rick were doing wasn’t okay. He was her _grandfather_. They shared genetic material. Of all the hang-ups and weird rules people put on sexuality, they were breaking the one that _biologically_ made a decent argument.

And honestly, she couldn’t even begin to make herself care, but that was a lot easier to face head on when she could pretend it wasn’t like she had a choice.

Rick clinked away with his screwdriver and soldering pen, undisturbed by Morty’s fidgeting and muffled sounds, her jaw and knees beginning to ache. She shifted again, trying to alleviate the pressure of bone against metal, but she was well versed at being uncomfortable. She quickly gave up, lowering herself to sit on her calves and leaning forward slightly to rub her temple against Rick’s thigh, seeking affection.

Rick rumbled out a small chuckle at the contact, briefly running one hand through her messy hair while the other lifted the bottle of booze to his lips and he returned to his work.

By the time Morty had adjusted to the stretch of her jaw, Rick hummed in the way that indicated he’d finished up his project. She tilted her head to look up at him and the sparks she felt along her spine at the sight of his excitement made her wish she could gulp.

His voice was hushed and excited as his fingers spun the screwdriver. “You’re – Morty you’re getting into too much trouble lately. You’ve been running your mouth and getting out of line and it’s – _uurp_ \- it’s been a real pain in my ass.”

She lifted her head and made a sad attempt to mumble something – maybe an apology – but the gag kept her silenced.

Morty wasn’t sure how to feel about the almost maniacal grin on his face – but so hobbled and trapped it wasn’t like she had any choice but to accept whatever form his wrath would take, so she tried to steady her rapid breathing and waited.

He set the screwdriver down and before Morty had prepared herself to feel the cold embrace of it, Rick had the collar lined up with the back of her neck. He gathered her hair, pulled it out of the loop, and snapped the two pieces together without a hint of warning.

Morty was fairly sure that the already too-few logical parts of her brain sunk to somewhere deep and unreachable at the sound of the collar _snick_ ing closed around her neck. Whatever was left was feral, instinctive, and absurdly – _painfully_ – aroused.

And Rick, the bright blue of his eyes totally eclipsed by his irises, didn’t look any saner.

“I don’t want to keep you down here again, Morty,” he almost whispered, breathing heavily. Morty’s eyes couldn’t drag themselves away from his lips. “It – it wasted my time, bud. Do you have any idea how ma- _auugh_ -ny adventures I had to hold off on cause I didn’t have my sidekick? We missed out on _a lot_ of good shit, Morty, a lot of – _eeurp_ \- real fine shit,” he spit out rapidly and the small part of her brain that wasn’t completely focused on the throbbing between her legs or the wet sheen of Rick’s tongue when he licked his lips wanted to notice that he only talked that fast if he was trying to obfuscate.

Rick leaned down on a knee and wrapped his arms around Morty’s waist, the slide of his body against hers a relief for her touch-starved skin. With a small grunt, he hefted her up and sat back down on his chair with her on his lap, her knees to either side of his hips. The spread of her legs dug the cuffs harshly into the skin of her ankles but the metal was wide-banded and designed for extended use – jeez, didn’t Morty know all about _that_ – and the slight pinch of pain only made her squirm in anticipation.

The lascivious grin darkening Rick’s brow sent a spiral of heat straight to Morty’s core and she tried her best to slot their hips together. She could feel the hard bulge of Rick’s erection pressing into her thigh but she wasn’t nearly high enough in his lap to get the right satisfaction from it.

For a moment, he was still, sparks dancing in his eyes while he watched her struggle against her binds to ride his lap. Under his gaze, her cheeks flamed but her embarrassment impractically added more fuel to her fire.

“So, _Mooorty_ ,” he rasped, drawing her name out tauntingly and licking his lips, his fingertips barely tracing the skin of her thighs. “I have to punish you but I do- _oough-_ n’t want to punish _myself_ at the same time, get what I mean?” He tugged her higher up into his lap while he sank lower in his seat until the hot brand of his fabric covered cock was pressing up against the denim at the V of her legs. Morty groaned behind her gag, the sound faint but raw. She was still sore but that only added a delicious ache to the mix that gave complexity to the sensation. “And if you can’t keep your mouth shut on your own, I’ll have to help you remember not to blab our fucking secret to the rest of the world.”

One hand drifted up to her collar and it gave out the familiar tinny little beep that she so hated. Then Rick rocked up into her, a cruel imitation of what she wanted only without so much clothing, but the muscle memory of their groins pressing together and the faint friction against her covered folds was enough to force a low, muffled moan to crawl up her throat.

But before the sound could hum out her nose, before Morty even had a chance to hear what sort of pathetic groan she’d managed to make around the intrusive gag, she was shot through with an electrical charge and she tensed, the breath coming through her nose ragged and panting once her body unclenched.

Morty was familiar enough with getting shocked by the collar that she recognized the feeling at once and her surprised, alarmed eyes found Rick’s but he looked too happy - borderline- _giddy_ \- and dread started to pool in Morty’s stomach right next to the massive balloon that was her aching need.

“I’m a fucking genius, Morty,” Rick assured her, sliding his cool hands up the sides of her ribcage, dragging her shirt up against the backs of his wrists. He scrunched it under her armpits, exposing her breasts to the cool air of the bunker and his ravenous gaze. Morty’s breath started huffing out her nose in erratic puffs.

At first he was gentle, icy fingers tracing the slight mound of her breasts; teasing, barely-there touches making Morty’s eyes roll into the back of her head, Rick’s hips rocking slowly below her barely providing any friction. She opened her eyes in time to see lightning strike behind Rick’s blown pupils before he pinched her nipples in a fierce twist, a pained/aroused keen pulled from her throat unbidden… and then lightning struck _her._

She was shocked again, this one longer and more intense, and her whole body seized tight as a wire. When the electricity receded, Rick was grinning at her, his fingers still too rough where they plucked her nipples into stiff peaks. “You figure it out yet, Morty,” he goaded, his slightly crooked teeth flashing threateningly in a smile that showed off his canines. His fingers _tap tap tapped_ at the metal around her neck. “Do you know what this is?”

Morty’s throat worked to dry swallow despite the intrusion in her mouth. She shook her head slowly, carefully, her eyes glued to Rick’s. She didn’t want to think it, she didn’t want it to be _true_ , she wanted to be asleep on the couch upstairs trapped somewhere between a nightmare and a wet dream.

“I made you your own shock collar, Morty,” Rick rasped, hands stroking down her sides and settling on her hips, rocking them in time with his slow thrusts. “To give you a little reminder, buddy, a little _incentive_ to keep from saying too much – to keep you from talking to the wrong people.” _Oh jeez…_ “And until you learn, you don’t get to say a- _auugh-_ nything _at all_.” He smirked at her, his brow lowering, casting his eyes in shadow. “You don’t want Summer to suffer cause you went and blabbed our little secret, _do you Morty_?”

Morty shook her head, her eyes prickling with tears even as she braced herself against Rick’s knee with her bound hands and pushed back against his rolling hips.

The half-lidded way Rick scanned Morty’s body, lingering on her bared breasts and the collar around her neck and her watery eyes turned her insides to molten lava. “Think I can take this out now?” Rick asked, his voice a mockery of kindness, his fingers tracing her stretched lips.

Morty nodded again, her mind racing. With a _click_ that pressed against her tongue, the intrusion in her mouth shrank back to its original, squishy shape and Rick pulled it from her mouth, dropping the wet gag into the open drawer next to him and slamming it closed before Morty had a chance to get a good look at it. She rotated her jaw and licked her lips, fighting the instinct to clear her throat while the lingering ache made her pussy pulse in time with her heart.

Rick was studying her like she was an experiment, bright eyes glued to her mouth, and it didn’t take a genius to know he was waiting for her to say something – waiting for her to shock herself again with the collar – and Morty glared back at him, determined not to give him the satisfaction.

Her stubbornness brought that wicked grin back to crinkle up the corners of his eyes and even though Morty knew there was no winning, she shivered at the thought of resisting. She tried to shift her legs but the cuffs on her legs pulled at her wrists and the tug sent a coil of heat to the wetness already pooling in her underwear.

“Got anything to say to me, Morty,” Rick taunted and Morty strained to rearrange herself more firmly onto the hard line of his erection but she didn’t have the leeway to move, his dick pulsing uselessly under her thigh. His hands on her hips were no help, holding her steady while he ground out his own pleasure and left her twisting after her own.

His grin was maniacal when she finally relented, gritting her teeth and hissing out, “ _Ass_ -”, the ‘ _hole_ ’ part getting caught in her throat when her spine arched with another shock, even stronger than the last. She was panting through her clenched jaw by the time she came back to herself enough to notice that Rick was almost falling off the chair with laughter, holding her tight to keep from bucking her off his lap.

“Oh, this is _good_ , Morty,” he admitted breathlessly through a chorus of chuckles, wiping a tear from his eye. “The shocks get stronger the more you talk.” Morty glared at him and that infuriating grin slipped back across his features. “But maybe you already figured that out.”

She tried to roll her hips again, leveling him with the flattest, angriest look she could muster up, but he only seemed more entertained at the sight of it.

So he wanted to watch her shock herself while they fucked around – Morty wasn’t very good at keeping quiet, there was a _reason_ he’d installed sound barriers in both their bedrooms – but that was fucked up, even for Rick’s standards. At least his ire seemed to have disappeared with her voice and Morty could be grateful for small favors. Currently, she was more interested in trying to tempt him into unzipping both their pants but doing so without words was a challenge she hadn’t anticipated.

She was thinking about leaning forward and sinking her teeth into his neck (half to rile him up, half to take out some well-earned aggression) when he startled her by consulting his watch like they _weren’t_ in the middle of something just starting to get good.

“Oh, look at that, Morty,” he said with fake earnestness, and Morty _wanted_ to say ‘ _fuck whatever it is you’re thinking, Rick, let’s get naked_ ’, but Rick might have guessed at some of those thoughts because half his unibrow quirked up and he smirked when he continued, “Just about time for dinner.”

It was such a non-sequitur that a confused, “Wha-” tried to jump out of her mouth only to be cut short by a shock so strong she nearly bit her own tongue. Rick looked happy with the results, bracing her against him and seemingly reveling in the taught line of her body writing against his through the jolt.

“ _Jeezus_ , that’s just too good,” he murmured into her hair and Morty thought _hard_ about head-butting him – his nose was _right there_ and so very breakable - but she decided that might not be the best idea if she wanted to keep him amenable.

When Rick leaned forward, his hands sliding down her arms to settle at her wrists, Morty blinked at the wall over his shoulder in bewilderment. They’d _barely_ just started screwing around – and Morty had been _sure_ he was going to torture her by coaxing sounds of pleasure out of her until her body was nothing but static charge.

But then the familiar _snick_ of the cuffs unlocking hit her ears and her limbs sagged, no longer held up and back so uncomfortably. Her legs uncurled, her toes brushing the ground, her knees aching from being bent so long, and Rick watched with heated eyes as she rolled her shoulders and rubbed her wrists.

She glared at him skeptically as Rick tucked the chain and cuffs into his lab coat pocket and took another long swig from the bottle with one hand, rubbing soothingly at her upper arm with the other. Then he burped and grinned and Morty had a fraction of a second to think ‘ _oh shit_ ’ before he wrapped his arms around her waist and hauled them both up to their feet. With a careless twitch of his wrist, he opened up a portal and shoved her through, his fingers wrapped around her bicep.

She stepped out into a nightmare only a million times worse because her subconscious wasn’t smart enough to so perfectly encapsulate so many of her fears into one awful situation. Because he’d walked them out into the _dining room_ and she was still wearing _his collar_.

Her brow broke out in sweat as Rick pushed her into the chair she always sat at during meals, pacing around behind her to hover like a spider over a fly trapped in its web. Mom and Summer’s voices filtered from the kitchen and they sounded happy but Morty couldn’t make out any words over the sound of her own blood pumping loud and fast in her ears. She shoved hard at the table in an attempt to stand, to get the fuck out of there, to dash up the stairs and hide out in her bedroom and avoid _whatever the fuck_ Rick was planning. But his hands landed heavily on her shoulders, shoving her back into her seat, keeping her down.

The rough push of his hands let up slowly as Morty sank into obedience, her breath coming rapid fast while that too-familiar chest ache of hyperventilation wrapped around her lungs like there wasn’t enough space inside of her for all the air she needed. Calmly, Rick’s fingers trailed up her shoulders to her neck, the gesture too intimate for the fifteen feet that separated them from mom and Summer. He traced the edge of her collar before he pressed his palm against the curve of her throat, fingering wrapping around her chin and forcing her to tilt her head up to meet his hard stare.

“ _Rick_ –” she barely whispered, completely forgetting what started this whole mess as her body convulsed through another shock, eyes scrunching closed in pain. When she opened them, Rick was still holding her chin in place, his fever bright eyes soaking up her discomfort like it was sustenance. She tried to shake her head, grasping and clawing at his hand and mouthing frantically, ‘ _Rick, please_ ’ but he only smiled, a slow, dangerous flash of teeth that sent a coil of fear to her stomach.

The light sound of Summer’s laughter broke the oppressive silence and Rick tilted his head pointedly, quirking his ear towards the door and furrowing the line of his eyebrow to a sinister V. “You said _anything_ , Morty,” he reminded her, his voice low and rough and dark. Morty shivered and, even though she knew it was useless, she wrapped her fingers around the metal at her neck and tried to pry it loose. Rick’s hands covered hers, and he sank low enough to press a lingering kiss to her forehead. And Morty _hated_ that the gesture was actually soothing despite the situation, despite his obvious sadism and her own distress.

‘ _They’ll know_ ,’ Morty mouthed instead, entreating him, pleading with him, anything to keep her from this embarrassment.

“Don’t worry, Morty,” he soothed, kicking out his own chair and dragging her hand towards him so he could bite at the thin skin of her wrist. “Trust me.”

And jeez, wasn’t the worst of it that she _did_?

“Dinner’s ready!” mom’s voice interrupted Morty’s death stare and she could _feel_ her face struggling to decide between whether it wanted to flush red with humiliation or go bloodless with dread. The result was a painful head-rush and Morty might have fallen out of her chair if Rick didn’t sling his arm along her shoulders, his hand a vice where he curved his palm around the base of her skull, right above the collar.

“Already in he- _eeeugh-_ re, sweetie,” Rick called and Morty wanted to cling to him - wanted to wring his neck, wanted to tackle him under the table and try to hide - but she could already hear footsteps padding through the sitting room. In one last attempt to keep her dignity Morty grabbed her hair, hunching her shoulders and pressing the two fistfuls of loose curls against her mute mouth to curtain the collar with the only thing at her disposal.

Rick cut her a glance, a little huff blowing out of his mouth as if he thought her desperate antics were funny, but Morty was too busy praying for death to parse him out a glare.

When her mother turned the corner into the dining room - a serving plate of something in one hand, a glass of wine in the other - Morty dropped her gaze to the table, her eyes locked on the small burn mark Rick’s butter-passing robot had seared into the wood grain when it blew itself up. Morty fiercely envied the robots ability to self-destruct on a whim; if she had the ability, she’d be taking advantage of it now. But since she couldn’t spontaneously combust, the closest she could do was curl in on herself as much as possible, hoping to become as invisible as she usually felt.

“Hey dad,” mom greeted Rick cheerfully and Morty felt a hole open up in her chest. _Oh god this was really happening._ The hole in her chest began spitting out organs, starting with her stomach. “Morty, why don’t you set the table,” was all the acknowledgement Morty got and like a lightbulb went off above her head, Morty jolted to attention.

_Yes!_ The perfect opportunity to make an escape! She shoved back away from the table with her legs, hands still desperately shielding her collar with her hair, and she was just about to jump to her feet when Rick’s hand clamped down on the nape of her neck, the pressure keeping her seated increasing as he stood and leaned his weight into her. Once he was on his feet, he pushed her chair back in until her ribs touched the table with every inhale.

“I got it,” Rick said, smiling at mom and shooting Morty a very pointed stare behind mom’s back – one that said ‘ _you better be there when I get back_ ’. And Morty – even though she _knew_ disobeying would only lead to more suffering – genuinely considered making a mad dash out the door. Fuck she’d go anywhere; she’d live on the streets, she’d join the fucking circus, she’d take to the goddamn sewers, _anything_ ; but she knew too well that Rick would follow.

“She can stand to help out every once in a while, Dad,” mom frowned, squinting at Morty like she had outlived her usefulness. Morty swallowed heavily and dropped her eyes back to the table. Mom laid a heaping plate of carnitas down in front of Rick’s spot and followed him back into the kitchen. “You spoil her,” Morty heard clearly – her mother had made no attempt to lower her voice – and a burble of hysterical laughter threatened to slither up Morty’s throat (laughter or tears, it was _very_ hard to tell at the moment) but she breathed deeply out of her nose and fought back her panic. Spoil her? _Spoil her_? Jeez – that was off-mark by a million miles.

Just like that, Morty had made up her mind. She was going to make a break for her room - _to hell_ with Rick’s threatening glance. She had just braced her legs to push her chair back again when Summer turned the corner and Morty froze solid in place.

The last time Morty had seen her sister, Summer had been wide-eyed with shock and fury, indignant Morty had let slip the fact that kissing Rick was… a part of her life…

Maybe Rick had explained things – figured out some lie to cover the hideous truth that Morty _loved_ kissing her grandfather. But even if that was true, even if Rick’s silver tongue had worked its magic and tricked Summer into complacency, there was _no way_ to talk their way out of the collar on top of that – not that Morty could explain herself without getting shocked, anyways.

But the rage or disgust (or at the very least, disdainful skepticism) that Morty had expected to see painted on Summer’s face when she caught sight of Morty was nowhere to be found. Instead Summer barely glanced at her younger sister while she slid the plate of taco toppings onto the table with an indifferent sort of grace, plopped the towel of warm tortillas down next to the plate, and pulled out her chair without saying a word. As soon as she was seated, she lifted her phone to her face and let herself be absorbed in the small screen, like this was just another day.

Two feelings warred for dominance in Morty’s stomach; disappointment that her sister made no attempts to look at her, to seek her out, to be sure Morty was okay after Rick’s sudden, forceful eviction of her from the living room earlier in the evening versus profound, _bone-melting_ relief. Because Morty was positive that if Summer’s hazel eyes met hers - that soft gleam of pity tenting her eyebrows into a look of concern - Morty might burst into hysterical tears and shock herself half to death.

Rick took that moment to reappear in the doorway, his gaze landing on Morty the second he entered the room. She could tell from the way he narrowed his eyes at her that he was pleased she had stayed put. That was one thing to be grateful for, at least. No doubt the rest of the evening was going to be a shit show but if Rick was _happy_ with her, it might go a little smoother. He doled out the plates calmly while mom sat down and topped off her already full glass of wine, propping her tablet up against the bowl of shredded cheese.

After he’d laid down everyone else’s plates, Rick held Morty’s out in offering - hovering it in front of her face, trying to force her to release her hair by urging her to grab it with a little side to side wiggle - but Morty refused, glaring up into his too-thrilled face and imagined clawing out his gleaming eyes. “She could stand to pull a bit of her own weight around here, Dad,” mom bit out without glancing up from her tablet and Morty felt the words like a slap across the face. The sharpness of her tone had even caught Summer’s attention and peripherally Morty saw her sister’s head tilt up.

Morty determinedly tried to bore a hole through the burn mark on the table with her mind, wishing more than ever she could evaporate out of existence.

Tension crackled in the air and Morty’s eyes jumped up to Rick’s on instinct - some hard wired programming forcing her to evaluate the impending danger – and she was just in time to watch his blue eyes harden to steel. She dropped her gaze back to the table, dread spooling in the pit of her belly.

Rick’s taunting plate wiggling stilled and he set the dish down softly in front of Morty’s elbows. Morty could _feel_ Summer’s penetrative gaze scraping over her skin like a sunburn and Morty silently begged Rick to keep his cool but she knew the odds weren’t good.

“Morty’s had a bit of a rough day,” Rick shrugged, seating himself and drinking deeply from the bottle he procured from one of his pockets. He looked completely casual - from the way he stretched out his legs under the table to the elbow he flung over the back of his chair - but Morty could sense an undertone of poison when he continued. “And wh- _aaaugh_ -at are you talking about ‘ _pull her own weight_ ’? She helps _me_ out.” He said it like it was the most important job in the galaxy, his voice not _quite_ a growl but there was a hard edge there he normally wouldn’t use with mom. “She’s my a- _aaaugh-_ ssistant or whatever.”

“I don’t see how _following you around all day_ equates to helping around the house.” Mom was frowning at Morty like _she_ was the one who had spoken and Morty did her best to hunch her shoulders and curve into herself. However Rick, despite his over-the-top casual act, started tightening up in real anger - Morty could tell just from the texture of the air – and if she had her voice, this was exactly the moment Morty would stammer something stupid or stilted or embarrassing, just to deescalate the tension.

But with no way to speak, she shivered in a room turned suddenly frigid with wrath.

In a last desperate bid, Morty’s eyes instinctively cut over to Summer to find her sister already laser focused on her. Summer - whose strategy had always been ignoring dining table drama - broke the brewing storm clouds by asking, “What kind of rough day,” somewhere between bored and faintly worried – and Morty barely resisted the urge to scream. Summer _knew_ what kind of bad day Morty had - _she’d been there_ _when Morty had opened her mouth and blabbed her worst secret_! Why was she acting like that hadn’t happened? Was Morty losing her fucking mind? “Morty, do you feel okay? You look like you’re gonna hurl.”

Morty couldn’t bear the traces of concern and confusion furrowing her sister’s pretty face into a frown so Morty kept her eyes glued to her plate, fistfuls of hair still pressed against her lips to keep the tsunami of emotions locked inside.

When Rick’s hand landed on top of her head, she jumped half a foot into the air. Rick’s laugh cut some of the tension from the table. “She’s just _embarrassed_ ,” he assured the Summer, the eye-roll audible in his tone. “She made a stupid mistake and now she’s got to live with the consequences.”

Morty’s heart was going to pound out of her chest. She was sure of it. Her chest was gonna pop open and she’d squirt blood and viscera all over the nice meal mom and Summer had taken the time to prepare. That sounded _way_ to close to the truth - too close for Morty’s poor heart to bear.

“If it’s not a bid deal…” mom trailed off, all too willing to leave things at that, lifting her glass of wine and shrugging while Morty had to release her hair and press a hand to her sternum to make sure she wasn’t about to explode because it _really_ felt like she might be going into cardiac arrest.

“ _What’s that_?” Summer demanded and Morty’s vision threatened to tunnel. Right. There was a reason she’d been holding her hair over her neck. She’d forgotten for just a second – the physical pain of her stress overcoming logical thinking – and now Summer had seen.

“Tha- _auuugh_ -t’s what she’s embarrassed about,” Rick answered flatly, knocking her other weak fist away from her mouth and showing off the collar like it wasn’t something both of them should be ashamed of, stretching his arm out over her shoulder in the comfortable, familiar way he always did, except now – with mom and Summer’s eyes transfixed by the band of metal around her neck – it felt like a dangerous push at their willingness to ignore the obvious.

“Dad, what _is_ that?” mom asked, and Morty felt a shiver of fear sluice down her spine at the edge of skepticism lacing mom’s question. Oh god. They were going to find out. This was her punishment. They were going to find out and they were going to hate her and then it wouldn’t matter if he locked her in the bunker for the rest of her life – there would be no one left who’d miss her.

“We were out on Tractus XII and everything was fine until _Moooorty_ made the executive decision to eat something I _specifically_ told her not to,” Rick rambled, the lie rolling off his tongue like he was spinning a tapestry. And _jeez_ was it believable the way he shaped it in his mouth. Morty might have eaten it up herself if she hadn’t _lived_ it.

“Now-” he surreptitiously pinched her _hard_ on the shoulder and the startled “ _ow!_ ” she bit out was garbled in agony, the shock from the collar bending her at the waist.

She might have conked her head against the edge of the table if Rick hadn’t caught her, his fingers curving over her mouth and bracing her head. Except… except he wasn’t just catching her from smashing her own lip open on the wooden tabletop – _he was pushing something into her mouth_. Something slimy and hard and cold that tasted like sweaty socks and rotten meat.

Morty gagged and Rick yanked his hand away as if disgusted. And being disgusted made a lot of sense because a long, slimy, greyish-green centipede tumbled out of Morty’s mouth and settled on her plate in a nasty pile of upturned legs. They jutted out stiffy in death – and while the sight of them and the fact they had just been _in her mouth_ threatened to set her gagging again, she was _wildly_ grateful those hundreds of little legs weren’t moving.

Wide-eyed, Morty turned her gaze to Rick who was doing his looking-bored-act, his lips curving up in a secret grin, probably pleased as fucking punch the table was silently digesting his words like they were gospel and staring horrified at the bug on Morty’s plate.

“Now she has parasites,” Rick finally finished, swiping her plate and the centipede off the table and pacing over to dump the terrible creature in the trash. When he returned, he slid a clean plate in front of Morty and helped himself to dinner, snatching up two tortillas and loading them up without a single glance at the horrified faces surrounding the table, even humming a little to himself in disinterest.

“She’s got _what_?!” Summer reiterated, a hand jumping up to cover her own mouth while Morty scrabbled for a napkin and wiped at her tongue. She could still _taste_ the thing… Where did Rick get it? How long had it been in his pocket? Why did he have to _shove it in her mouth_?!

“ _Parasites_ , Sum-Sum. You know. _Bugs._ ”

“Dad – is that – don’t tell me that’s _contagious_ -” Mom looked horrified too but even Morty wouldn’t mistake her self-interest for concern.

“Everything’s pe _-eeerugh_ -rfectly fine, sweetie. We’ve just got to wait ‘em out.”

“And the –” Summer gestured to her own neck, her cheeks still a little green.

“The collar makes sure they’re dead when they come up. Believe me, you do _not_ want them to pop out alive –” he took a big bite of his taco, continuing his rant around the food in his mouth, “- they could really – _errup_ \- fuck our shit up you know – really shake up the whole ecosystem if they managed to get away.”

Everyone but Rick seemed to be in shock but mom took a long pull from her wine glass and turned towards the kitchen where the bug no doubt lay at the top of the garbage. After one more searching look at Rick, she shrugged and reached out a steady hand to assemble a taco.

“And this’ll take care of them; the parasites?” she asked, but the question was almost rhetorical. Morty could tell mom trusted Rick completely - that she had decided that if _he_ was sitting there like everything was just fine, that everything _was_ in fact _just fine_ and she didn’t need to worry herself about it. She wasn’t about to complain that her youngest daughter was wearing a humiliating metal collar and supposedly spewing out bugs – not if it meant Rick was sitting down to dinner with a smile on his face.

And Rick _was_ smiling; his crooked teeth flashing briefly in a way that Morty knew meant he was extra-thrilled by his successful subterfuge. “Absolutely,” he promised, his hand petting down the back of Morty’s head and landing again at the nape of her neck, just above the collar.

“Will Morty be okay?” Summer asked, her voice stern, and Morty wondered what had happened to that girl who looked ready to blow Rick’s brains out the second he’d portaled into the living room. How was she so blasé about a collar around Morty’s neck when she’d seen her hauled off earlier by a furious Rick? That didn’t make sense for Summer – she was stubborn and smart and (with the slight exception of her various mood swings) had generally taken up the habit of looking out for Morty, at least when she was around.

But now she was sitting across the table like Morty hadn’t practically admitted to _incest_ without any follow up questions.

Morty’s mind drifted back to the gun-shaped thing Rick had tucked into his pocket and the little half-cring he’d done when she pleaded with him not to send Summer away and the cabinet full of sleeping doppelgangers just _waiting_ in the bunker.

Had… had Summer been replaced with her robot? Was that why she was acting like everything was _normal_ when it most decidedly was _not_? Was the real Summer locked up underground or thrown out into the vastness of the multiverse or… or maybe even…?

_Oh jeez,_ please _not that_.

Morty studied her sister closely - watched the way she rolled a torn up piece of tortilla between her fingers distractedly and squinted at Rick - searching for a silver gleam in the rim of her hazel eyes, but it was _impossible_ to tell.

“Morty’s just fine,” Rick sing-songed, light and airy like worrying about Morty was a waste of time. “They’ll be outta her system in no time at all. They feed off the vibrations from her vocal chords so she’s gotta stay quiet -” Rick shot Morty a hot look - a _secret_ look - and despite everything she felt that stupid flip-flop in her stomach that his we’re-in-this-together grin always inspired. Sometimes she _really_ hated herself. “- but she’ll live. Maybe even learn a thing or two about listening to her old grandpa. Isn’t that right, _Morty_.”

His palm gently squeezed the back of her neck, his fingers threaded through her hair. Mom was already swiping through her tablet and Summer (or _whoever_ that was) shot Morty one last lingering look before she shrugged and turned away, diving back into scrolling through her phone.

Morty swung her disconsolate gaze towards Rick - the only person in the room who hadn’t taken the first opportunity to check out - his manic eyes fixed to her like he was trying to dive into her pupils and swim in her soul.

She was completely cornered. He could do whatever he wanted to her – he could lock her up and collar her and silence her at her own fucking dinner table in front of her mother and sister – and somehow he could _get away with it._

‘ _Jeezus maybe he_ is _a god_ ,’ Morty thought as she stared at Rick and watched her own reflection sizzle in the darks of his eyes.

There was little for Morty to do but nod in miserable agreement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let's take a hard turn back to Fucked Up City, who's down?


	17. Chapter Seventeen

Morty didn’t have much of an appetite for dinner when the ghost of a million tiny legs still haunted her tongue.

So she nodded to Rick in silent acceptance of his omnipotence over her life, turning back to her plate and trying to put as much mental distance between herself and what was happening as she could. It was easy; the table was quiet except for the occasional notification sounds from Summer’s phone and the wet noises of three people chewing.

The silence wasn’t totally unusual except there was some kind of tension between mom and Rick that Morty couldn’t quite make sense of – usually they’d chat or joke around a bit once mom had enough wine to make studying impossible – but whatever beef mom was working up to, she never wound up voicing it out loud.

In an attempt to take her mind off the _colossal joke_ that was her life, Morty let her thoughts drift; did something happen on Rick and mom’s day out together? They hadn’t been in the best mood the morning before they’d left and they didn’t come home together either. Then again, mom was perpetually frustrated lately – though she dreaded Rick’s leaving with a tangible fear that usually kept him exempt from blame – so Morty wasn’t sure what to make of the strange new uneasiness.

Eventually Rick set a taco pointedly on Morty’s plate and startled her out of her dissociative fugue – a perfectly loaded tortilla with an even spread of carnitas, salsa, and lots of cheese. He’d left the lettuce off, just how she liked it, and he watched her with half of his eyebrow quirked until she picked it up and bit into it.

At least it washed away the faint earthy taste of centipede still clinging to the back of her tongue.

She ate mechanically, too stressed to do anything but stare through her plate, and when she looked up the sky outside the window was dark. Summer (or whoever was masquerading as Summer - _jeez_ ) was gone and her mom’s plate had been pushed aside so she could scribble furiously in a notebook. Rick leaned back in his chair, took a long swig of whiskey, and burped. Morty pointedly didn’t turn to catch his eye but she could sense him seeking out her attention.

Feeling like the weight of the collar had quadrupled since she’d been shoved into her seat, Morty stood and cleared the table, too aware of Rick’s eyes burning into the back of her head as she collected everyone’s plates into a stack, balanced the serving dishes with her other arm and carried everything into the kitchen, Rick’s heavy footfalls trailing close behind her.

Wordlessly he put the leftovers in Tupperware and stored them in the fridge while Morty loaded the dishwasher. Not that taking care of the dirty dishes was enough to satisfy mom, apparently - Morty’s docile cleaning was probably pissing her mother off instead of paving a path to forgiveness – but _everything_ Morty did seemed to piss her off lately. At least doing a round of dishes made Morty feel slightly less guilty for… _everything_... but only slightly.

Because mom hadn’t been exaggerating, Morty _didn’t_ really do many chores anymore, not now that her and Rick were hardly ever separated and he hated to waste his time with household bullshit. Generally, if she was supposed to mow the lawn or wash the car or clean the floors, Rick would either build something to do it for her or summon a meeseeks from that box in the garage and sic them on the living room with the vacuum.

But Morty still helped Rick cook dinner when he deigned to play chef and handed him tools when he tuned up mom’s car and generally was the only one who ever washed the dishes and - _oh yeah, that’s right_ \- fucking locked herself underground for a month and a half all so mom wouldn’t kill herself pining for Rick.

Morty sucked her cheek between her teeth and bit down hard to put a stop to that line of thought.

That wasn’t fair. Mom had a right to hate Morty _. Everyone should_. She’d earned that sort of simmering anger in so many different ways it wasn’t worth counting them out. Just thinking about the fifth plate that never needed washing anymore was enough to turn the acid in Morty’s stomach into tar.

When the dishes were loaded and the washer turned on, she found Rick leaning against the counter and staring at her hard, the bottle of whiskey tilted up to his lips. He made some kind of face at her – something like a scowl but a little less angry – and beckoned her forward by holding out his arm.

Morty didn’t really want to be with Rick right now but the alternative was being alone with herself and the collar and mom’s hovering rage and that seemed so much worse. So she padded into his open arm and let him lead her through a portal to his bedroom.

Once the swirl of green irised closed behind them, he dropped to his knees and pulled her into a bear hug, his arms strong and a little crushing but so very skilled in the art of holding her together. He smelled like whiskey and it was hard to mark the exact point in her life when the smell stopped triggering a disgusted cringe and started radiating comfort but she breathed the woody, astringent sniff she took of Rick’s neck out in a sigh.

“You did so good, Morty,” he praised, his big palm holding her head in place so he could whisper into her ear. Her lip wobbled threateningly. Kind words were always the surest way to destroy her - especially after the way her mother’s eyes had flashed with hatred - and she stared pointedly at the wall of fluttering blueprints trying to read Rick’s uneven scrawl through progressively watery eyes. “You’re so perfect, bud, just – _uuurp_ \- such a fucking treasure.”

She didn’t want Rick to know that he was getting to her, she didn’t want to give him the satisfaction, but suddenly it was all too much. The awful way he wound her up and held her over the edge. The way he treated her like some kind of experiment. The way he could take away _everything_ with half a thought and leave her twisting on the line.

She tried to take a deep steady breath but it shook with the force of her holding back tears.

Rick stilled, his long arms wrapping around her waist and pulling her against his chest, cradling her gently while he pressed his face against her shoulder, almost _nuzzling_ the metal at her neck. “ _Shh shh shh_ , Morty,” he rumbled, his voice dark chocolate with a bitter edge. “I’ve got you, bud, I’m right here. Grandpa’s here.”

And Morty hated him in that moment, hated that he could be so gentle and so cruel, hated the emotional whiplash he wielded like a weapon, hated that he was the only person who would hold her when she cried even though it was almost always him who inspired her tears.

She melted into his arms like a pile of useless goo and buried her face against the lapel of his lab coat, letting it absorb her confused tears.

How dare he take her _voice_. Yeah, she knew… she knew well enough it was _annoying_ and her stutter only made it worse. Hadn’t Summer told her that a million times growing up? Hadn’t her classmates made fun of her endlessly for the stammering that only got worse the more they taunted her? Wasn’t her lack of communication skills _exactly_ the thing she hated the most about herself despite the list a mile long filled with her faults?

But to have it taken away…

She struggled briefly against his hold – more to see how Rick would respond than any real desire to escape the terrible comfort of his embrace – but Rick only held her tighter, shifting her until most of her weight was propped against his chest.

“Oh, my poor Morty, my sweet girl,” Rick whispered into her ear and the little sob that escaped her ratcheted a spike of lightning through her body thanks to the collar. This time, at least, Rick wasn’t laughing when she unclenched, his face somber and serious when he pulled back, cupping her cheek in his palm and looking over her sniveling face with sympathy.

“You have to learn, Morty,” he vowed and those words last spoken to her had been the start of something horrible. “If pe- _eeeugh-_ ople found out, they’d want to split us up, Morty, is that what you want?” She didn’t dare consider her answer, too afraid of what she might find in her thoughts. Luckily it didn’t seem like Rick expected a response – why would he? _It wasn’t like she could answer._ “I’m doing this for – _eerup -_ for your own good, bud.”

But there was a glint in his eye, one that her body strained to respond to even as she pushed her feelings down with indignation. He was _loving_ this. Of course he was. And what started as a spark blazed into a forest fire as he raked his eyes across her features greedily, eating up her tearstained cheeks and pink eyes, finally drifting down to stare transfixed at the metal around her throat.

His fingers traced the band almost reverently and Morty tried not to clench her legs as a wave of heat licked through her all the way down to her core, completely against her will. To be the center of Rick’s attention was a heady thing.

“How long do you think I can get away with this Morty?” he whispered, his voice harsh and raspy. She caught herself before she let her breath escape in a gasp. “One week? _Two_? Jeezus, I bet I could lock a gag in your mouth and tell them it was for your own good _and they’d believe me, Morty_. They’re all – I’ve got them wrapped around my finger, bud. And you…” he dragged his hands down her body, pawing at her breasts through the rough cotton of her shirt and squeezing her ass hard enough she rocked up onto her toes. “You’re all mine, aren’t you, Morty?”

And god, she wanted to say yes – wanted to nod her agreement – because wasn’t that fucking true? She wanted to let herself get wrapped up in the unmistakable heat of him setting her on fire, wanted to rip off his clothes and feel the length of his body skin-to-skin. She wanted to throw herself into his bed and let him do whatever he wanted because she never had the stamina to fight against the pursuit of her own pleasure.

And at least… at least _he_ wanted her.

But Morty _knew_ that letting him use her when she was so furious would be a mistake. It would set a precedent. There were so few lines they hadn’t crossed already but this felt like one of the last and she would defend it like her life depended on it – like her _sanity_ depended on it – because it very well might.

Rick, sensing the way she’d stiffened in his hold, leaned back far enough to get a look at her face. She could _feel_ the way he pulled her thoughts straight from her head, the way he knew at just a glance what she’d been thinking, and something terrible and clever passed across his features, his head tilting a bit as he furrowed his brow. His hands smoothed over the back pockets of her shorts, soft and soothing instead of groping and he pressed a gentle kiss first to her forehead and then to both her wet eyelids.

“Do you want some time alone?” he asked gently and of all the things she thought he might say, she _never_ thought he’d ask that. A fresh stream of tears poured out of her eyes very much against her will and she wiped them away angrily while she shook her head ‘no’. “Do you want to stay here with me?” He never _asked_. Why was he asking now? How was _she_ supposed to make up her mind when it was all mixed up and confused and he was the one always telling her what to do? Her face crumpled with the effort to keep her crying quiet and she shook her head again. Midway through the motion, though, her head changed course and she wound up nodding. Why did Rick have to be so _complicated_?

His eyes were deep and steady when she dragged up the courage to glare into his face. “Do you want me to decide, Morty?” he offered and his voice was aged whiskey and cyanide, a pit-fall hidden under a carpet, a bear-trap buried out in the woods.

Morty nodded her head emphatically ‘yes’.

“Okay, come here bud,” her urged, leading her to the edge of the bed and sitting her down on it. She wiped her face off on the inside of her shirt and was surprised when she felt a tentative touch at her shoes, Rick untying the laces and yanking them off her feet calmly, dragging her socks off afterwards and stroking his thumb along the arch of her foot. When he reached for the button of her shorts, Morty half slapped him away but he cut her a look and said, “Just getting you comfortable, Morty,” in a rich, even tone, and she had no choice but to let him have his way, pulling her shorts down her legs until she was left in just her underwear and t-shirt.

When he straightened up, he undressed himself without any of the usual vigor or aplomb he used when he planned on tackling her into the sheets. She was comforted when he stopped still clad in his boxers and tank top, crawling along the bed to lay down without touching her once.

She turned to him, studying the strangely flat line of his unibrow and the placid way he stared right back at her. He was being… oddly respectful… and she _hated_ the rush of feelings trying to swell up her heart. She shouldn’t feel _grateful_ for the inch of space he was allowing her when she knew her boundaries meant jack-shit to him. She shouldn’t think of it as kindness or generosity. She shouldn’t love him more for that small hint at something human, that tiny fraction of consideration – except she _did_ and she ached for it.

He stretched out an arm along the unoccupied pillow next to him, an invitation to lay her head down, an offer to be held, and Morty hated hated _hated_ how much she wanted to let him curl around her until she’d sunk through his skin and disappeared.

She should resist. She didn’t want to let him think he could keep treating her this way, she didn’t want him to go on believing that he could do _anything_ to her and never face the consequences. He could _never know_ that she was pretty sure she’d still love him even if he cut of all her limbs and fed them to her because – _jeez_ \- who knew _what_ he’d do with that sort of information.

But she couldn’t stop staring at the pillow she thought of as hers, at the curve of his body that she knew fit her so well, at that even, nonjudgmental expression he kept purposely open as he waited patiently for a response.

“Do you want the cuffs again, buddy?” he finally broke the silence she was torturing herself with. She carefully didn’t move, didn’t tilt her head in any direction or breathe too deep. She just wanted to check out – she didn’t want to fight herself anymore, she didn’t want to feel conflicted, she didn’t want to hate herself for seeking out the only comfort that existed in her strange, impractical life. With one glance he read her mind. “That’s right, I’ll decide.”

He leaned over the edge of the bed and when he pulled himself back up, both set of cuffs were shining in his hands. Morty purposely didn’t let herself think about the way she complacently held her wrists out in front of her and then twisted to offer her ankles. She didn’t think about how nice it was – how _doted upon_ she felt - when Rick pulled down the covers and helped guide her into that warmth. And she didn’t think about how soothing the sound of his heartbeat was where it pressed against her ear or the way she clung to his tank top like if she didn’t she’d sink through the mattress and be buried underground.

In his arms, it was much easier to stop her silent tears and wasn’t that just the problem? She hated him almost as much as she loved him, and on both accounts it was too much.

  

* * *

 

 

When Morty woke up the next morning, it was to the sight of her own hands, now uncuffed - still clasping a fistful of Rick’s tank top like a lifeline - her similarly uncuffed legs tangled up with his. Rick’s bony shoulder was digging into her cheekbone and she was pretty sure he was drooling onto her forehead, his lips pressed to her hairline, but that sort of wake up was fairly routine.

In fact it was so normal, it took her a moment to remember why a bubble of frustration was lodged in her throat like a popcorn kernel. Then she shifted slightly, turning her head to press her forehead against Rick’s arm, and the weight of metal around her neck came as an unhappy reminder.

Right. She was silenced with a shock collar like a dog who wouldn’t stop barking. And mom and Summer both knew about her predicament and had accepted the information with less follow up questions than if Rick had announced she needed orthodontic work done. Morty wondered if being a Morty was this hard for all the other ones too or if she had won a special lottery.

She sighed out a long breath and was minutely grateful that the slight rush of air wasn’t enough to set off the collar.

Luckily, she had plenty of practice crawling out of bed without disturbing the sleeping dragon. It was a bit of work to pull away slow enough to avoid Rick’s greedy instincts that liked to tug her back to his chest and hold on three times tighter (or on one memorable occasion, startling him enough to blearily brandish a mean looking knife an inch from her nose), but she managed the feat without waking him. She suspected - based on the half-empty bottle of vodka next to the two sets of cuffs nested in the blankets by her feet - that Rick had stayed up after she’d passed out, drinking himself to oblivion before curling up around her and joining her in sleep. And if he’d drank himself to unconsciousness, he probably wasn’t going to be getting up before ten at the earliest.

That suited her just fine. A little time to herself might be a good idea.

Midway through washing her face, Morty glanced up into the mirror and caught sight of the blinking lights flickering around her neck, her hands lowering and gripping the edge of the sink. She’d seen herself in the collar before – briefly during those three days of bliss spent mostly in Rick’s bedroom chained to his headboard (and of course there was that selfie she hadn’t quite worked up the nerve to look at again, even if only to delete it) – but after the bunker, looking in the mirror had been… hard… so she’d spent as little time contemplating herself as possible.

Now that she had a new opportunity, she leaned in closer and pulled her hair back, glaring at it from every angle she could manage.

It was a little strange to be so intimately well acquainted with something she’d hardly ever seen. She knew the weight of it on her shoulders and her fingertips had memorized every ridge and bump, but she didn’t know there was one solid red light and one blinking green. The place the two halves latched together – a place her fingers couldn’t barely discern apart from smooth metal – was visibly seamless. And there was a small display panel centered against her throat that must be new because she didn’t remember seeing it when she’d first discovered the collar and foolishly put herself in it.

It showed a straight green line and against her better judgment, Morty cleared her throat, watching the line wiggle with the soundwave right as a shock crawled down her spine.

Once she recovered from her experiment (and glared at herself briefly in the mirror), she let her hair hang loose around her shoulders and tried to absorb the image of the collar back around her neck.

Maybe it was her perspective that had warped, but it didn’t strike her as anachronistic as it did when she’d snapped that selfie a few months prior. Back then, she’d been thinking about how out of place the metal looked around her neck – how it clashed with her simple clothes and her rounded face – but she didn’t think that anymore. Now the sight of it made her feel like Rick was standing behind her, a heavy hand laid on her shoulder, fingers inching towards her neck.

And that was a common enough reality that it was pretty much how she pictured the two of them together anyways.

With a hard mental shake, Morty blinked and scowled, grabbing the star pendant around her neck and shoving it under the neckline of her t-shirt. It hurt to look at it dangling underneath the hard lines of the collar.

The house was quiet as she made her way to the kitchen. Mornings in the summer were bright and sunlight spilled into the dining room in cheery golden stripes. It painted such a strangely friendly picture that Morty had a hard time believing that the memories from last night – the ones where mom and Summer happily ate up Rick’s bullshit and turned a blind eye to Morty’s obvious anguish – had unfolded in the same place.

She purposely turned away from the table, heading towards the kitchen, her stomach extra empty thanks to her lack of appetite the night before.

Sitting at the kitchen counter, Morty ate her cereal slow enough that by the time she was at the bottom of the bowl, the dehydrated marshmallows had puffed up to twice their normal size. Already she’d been shocked three times in the kitchen alone (she yawned reaching for the milk, and sneezed twice in painfully quick succession) and that didn’t bode well for the rest of her day.

Normally, it was pretty hard to be upset while eating a bowl of Strawberry Smiggles but somehow she was still _pissed_ , and sustained anger was such an anomaly for her that she wasn’t sure what to do with the writhing mass of rage coiling in her guts.

She was thinking about taking a swing at Rick. Maybe even a few. But he was way better at fighting than she was and she would inevitably get her ass handed to her. _Still_ if she could land one solid punch to his stupid smug jaw, it might be worth it…

The one good thing – the _only_ thing she had going for her currently – was that mom was working the day shift, both her car and Summer’s spaceship disappeared from the driveway, so no one was left around the house to notice if she skipped her remedial math class. Cause _no way_ was she going out with this fucking thing around her neck. Nope, if Rick was going to be such a massive asshole, she would spend the week on the couch watching TV until he had gratified himself with his little revenge and taken the damn thing off.

She had just finished rinsing her bowl off in the sink when she turned and caught sight of Rick’s ominous, lean figure hovering in the doorway to the living room. His grin was bad news and she knew with a glance that her quiet plans to pass her day on the couch were utterly fucked.

Her body (despite its awkwardness and less than perfect looks) was a finely tuned machine in regards to adrenaline responses. The near constant danger of adventuring with Rick had convinced her that while her head tended to fuck things up, her body – with its lightning fast responses and split second decision making skills – generally could be trusted to act with her best interests at heart and save itself.

So when Rick’s eyes glittered maliciously and he unfolded his arms, stalking towards her with the rolling gait of a predator, irrationally, _insanely_ , her response was to run.

She was already over the kitchen counter and halfway to the front door by the time she realized what she was doing and started screaming obscenities at herself in her head. Oh she was _fucked_. Her body had _fucked her over_. She would never trust it again! But right at that moment, with Rick’s manic laugh close on her tails, she couldn’t have calmly stopped and given herself up to him if her life depended on it.

She grabbed hold of one of the dining room chairs and threw it behind herself blindly, hoping it might trip him up, but with a surprised cackle, he caught her by the waistband of her jeans and the two of them nearly toppled over each other as he yanked her to a halt.

When he tried to spin her into his arms, she let all the rage and adrenaline and the fear from being chased ball up her fist and slam it into his jaw, just like she’d been imagining while eating her cereal.

His head swung back, less from the force of her punch than from the shock of her attack – she could tell from the way his eyes widened and his eyebrow climbed up his forehead. He caught her wrist, his expression a little vacant as he rolled his eyes down to hers and never before had Morty understood the expression ‘ _throwing yourself at the mercy of god_ ’ so clearly as she did at that moment.

“I’m -” she automatically opened her mouth to apologize but her body clenched with the shock from her collar before she could make it to the important word. And Rick was just staring at her, almost looking through her, like he hadn’t imagined she had it in her and had to recalculate the world in order to accommodate this new information.

“Not a bad punch, _Moooorty_ ,” he goaded when he finally snapped back to the present, his free hand rubbing at the place her fist had made contact with his face. It wasn’t even like that was the first time she’d hit him. They fought a lot and not always playfully. Sometimes she had to wrestle him away from the steering wheel mid-flight because he was flying too recklessly and/or drunk. At least twice he’d jumped out at her during a stealth mission and she’d pounced on instinct, barraging him with her fists. And there was that one time he wound up wrestling with a shapeshifter and they started pulling the whole, ‘I’m _the real Rick, shoot_ him’ cliché. She’d shot them both in the leg. The shapeshifter had morphed to its original form in agony and Rick had hardly glanced at the hole seared through his leg when he snatched the gun from her hand and blasted its head off. Everything worked out in the end.

But this was different. This was standing up for herself and _resisting Rick_ and she could tell he was weighing something in his mind, debating whether he needed to make a big deal out of her momentary insanity or whether he could forgive her transgression. His decision became clear when a mean little smirk tilted up his mouth and he asked her, “Morty, shouldn’t you be at summer school?” looking entirely too happy with himself.

When his statement sank past the terror clouding her head, Morty fought him in earnest, pressing a foot to the center of his chest and wrestling to dislodge his grip on her wrist. She kicked at him and writhed, trying to shove him off with all her energy, but he was so much stronger than her and his arms were long and far reaching. She couldn’t bottle in the whine crawling up her throat in frustration and when her body clenched with the resultant shock from the collar, Rick easily gained the upper hand. After the jolt of electricity released her, she was left panting and squirming, trapped in a headlock while he dragged her towards the garage, swiping up her backpack on the way.

“I wouldn’t want you to –” Rick broke off momentarily to strain with effort - Morty had grabbed a hold of the kitchen doorframe but with one strong tug, her fingers lost their grip, “- miss out on your education.” He was laughing – _of course_ he was laughing – and if it wasn’t _her_ getting dragged into what was bound to be a new all-time low, she might have laughed too. They had to look ridiculous, her struggling silently but unceasingly while he kept on having to pause to unwind her grasping hands from walls and cabinets or take quick breaks to give into bouts of taunting guffaws.

By the time they made it to the ship, Morty was sweaty and exhausted and so _so_ sick of hearing Rick laugh. He shoved her in through his door, snickering when she lunged for the passenger side just to hear the locks _thunk_ ominously before she could pull the handle. Rick tossed her backpack at her before he pulled a flask out of his pocket and took a sip, his lips still curved in a smirk. Morty was struck again by how _unfair_ it was that she was collapsing against her seat with fatigue while the _seventy year old man_ leaned back with a calm smile like they’d hardly done more that take a brisk stroll.

Jeezus, he really would outlive her.

Rick chuckled again, slow and easy, and if it weren’t for how much she hated him right then, it would have been exactly the kind of chuckle she actually loved. Quiet, pleased contentment oozed out of his pores, which was usually so contagious but the effects were overshadowed by how _done_ she was with him and his bullshit. He thoughtlessly jerked the steering wheel and took them out of the garage and up into the air.

Once she caught her breath, Morty did her best to communicate ‘ _I hate you so much right now_ ’ with her eyes alone but that only inspired another round of laughter.

“It wo- _ouuugh-_ uldn’t be a punishment if you didn’t _suffer,_ Morty,” Rick sing-songed as he crash-landed the ship outside the school entrance. She was late for class so the front entrance was mercifully uninhabited but she scowled and glared fiery daggers back at Rick, telegraphing ‘ _I’m not going_ ’ with her firm grip on the armrest.

“You’re going in there one way or another, Morty,” he growled but the leering smile diffused some of the anger in his tone. Though that wasn’t any comfort to Morty who knew too well that Rick always got what he wanted, most frequently at her expense. She swallowed heavily and clenched her fingers tighter around the armrest while Rick took another pull from his flask. “I can drag you in there kicking and scr- _eaaagh-_ eaming – or well, kicking at least,” he chucked her under the chin sounding entirely too pleased and Morty jerked away from his touch. He scowled at her quick dodge and reached his hand into his pocket, tossing the metal restraints onto the dashboard in an ominous threat, “O- _ooough-_ r you could make your life a lot easier and stop fighting me on this, Morty.”

With a muted _thunk_ , the doors unlocked and Morty took three slow breaths before she managed to unwind her fingers from their death grip on the splitting leather.

“Whatever the case is, you’re going in there to show off that collar,” he promised, his voice inky black. He leaned forward and wrapped his hand around her neck, _around the collar_ , a cold spark turning the blue of his right eye silver when the sunlight caught it just right. “I think everyone should know that you belong to _me_ , Morty.”

Morty swallowed heavily, the sound audible in the quiet of the ship, and she didn’t doubt for a _second_ that he would keep his word, that he would drag her all the way to her classroom cuffed and struggling, drawing even _more_ attention to her and by extension the band of metal wrapped around her neck. And she was already considered a freak, the weird girl, the quiet nut-job voted most likely to bring a gun to school. Did she really need to make it any worse for herself?

She glanced longingly out the window to the path that led to the sidewalk and the way home. She’d never outrun him. She was fast, but _he_ was faster.

For one brief, steadying moment, Morty pinched the gem dangling from her wrist between her fingers wishing she was anywhere else but where she was. If she had said yes to Ric – if she had stayed on the Palisade – she wouldn’t be living out this new level of mortification. She’d probably have friends and the freedom to do whatever she wanted and would never have known what the weight of a collar around her neck.

But in that scenario, she also wouldn’t have _Rick_ , and – even now, even when he was the _worst_ kind of asshole imaginable – that thought sucked all the air right out of her lungs. He first unclenched from around the topaz on her bracelet and she shoved those useless fantasies to the farthest corner of her mind.

Shooting Rick the most scathing glare she could muster and surreptitiously squaring her shoulders, she shoved open the door and unfolded herself from the ship. She was trying to scrabble together the last twigs of her dignity to carry as a torch – if this was happening, she could at least _pretend_ to be unaffected, that was the last thing she had left to use against Rick - but her foot caught on the edge of the floor mat and she stumbled onto the sidewalk. Because _of course she did._

But she quickly righted herself and tried her best to channel confidence as she approached the school, shrugging her backpack over one arm and fiddling with her hair, pulling it in front of her shoulders in an attempt to hide as much of the metal from view as possible. If she had known she was going to be sent to school, she’d have dug out a hoodie or something to better hide the collar – or fuck it a scarf even if it was the middle of summer and the tarmac was glistening with heat. _Anything_ would be better than the t-shirt whose stretched neck (thanks to her and Rick’s tussling) dragged low enough to perfectly show off the brand of his ownership.

She wasn’t thrilled (nor exactly _surprised_ ) when she heard Rick’s door open and close behind her but she did her best to ignore the tread of his footsteps at her heels and the slightly metallic jangling noises the things in his pockets made as they clanked together.

Rick was no stranger to her school hallways – something that Morty figured had to be some kind of dead give-away for his less-than-socially-acceptable behavior towards her but no one ever brought it up. After all, who else had a grandpa who knew which classroom they’d be in at any given hour? Whose _parents_ could claim that much?

Most of the students, all the teachers, and _Principal Vagina himself_ knew Rick by name and _liked_ him – no one ever blinked when Rick turned the corner to tower over the sea of teenagers milling the halls in the middle of the day. They’d call out greetings like he was an old friend, like he was the star quarterback not someone’s fucking grandfather (though selling drugs and hosting parties might have a lot to do with his following), and he’d grunt at them in acknowledgement or throw out a joke while he bee-lined to Morty. Then they’d disappear, the two of them together – sometimes he’d even pull her out of class in the middle of a lesson and absolutely no one would try to stop him.

Then again, Rick made friends everywhere he went – or well, maybe not _friends_. Connections. Marks. Patsies. But the facts were undeniable - he was a popular man and he could do whatever he wanted.

Usually that was a point of pride for Morty; out of all the people climbing all over each other to get just a sliver of his time, Rick chose _her_ for company. But right now, his thick aura at her back felt nothing but oppressive.

The door to the math room was open, Mr. Goldenfold’s voice carrying out into the hallway, and even though Morty knew it was useless she couldn’t help the way her footsteps slowed as they approached the site of her inevitable embarrassment.

Morty had expected Rick to leave her off at the door, to shove her through and gloat from the hallway while he listened in on what would undoubtedly be a really awkward lecture about her tardiness and the strange device around her neck then a string of questions which she wouldn’t be able to answer with words.

But instead, Rick strode through the door like the room belonged to him, interrupting Mr. Goldenfold’s explanation of an equation on the board and rousing even the sleepiest of students napping in the back of the room.

Morty prayed a freak aneurism would strike her down and put her out of her misery - that some previously undetected tumor would expanded and cut off blood flow to her brain, that the volcano under Yellowstone would just set off already - but that was the sort of luck Morty repelled like she was designed to be unfortunate.

“Well if it isn’t Rick Sanchez -” Mr. Goldenfold exclaimed and Morty thought there was too much pleasure in the tone considering he was addressing someone who had disturbed his class mid-lesson, “- and Morty Smith,” he went on, sounding much more appropriately annoyed. She didn’t miss the pointed way her teacher’s eyes swept over her and landed on the band of metal around her neck though his apathetic features didn’t shift from the completely uninterested expression he wore to school most days.

“Hey Goldenfold.” Rick started and she knew the voice he was using; it was the voice he used when he was dealing drugs to teenagers – the I’m-a-cool-harmless-old-man voice. The you-know-I’ve-got-the-best-shit-in-town voice. The don’t-you-wish-I-was- _your_ -grandpa voice. “Sorry to inte- _eeeugh-_ rrupt your - _eerup_ \- lesson but I needed to have a word with you about Morty.” He shoved her forward a bit and if her cheeks got any hotter, they’d ignite. Every eye in the classroom was focused on her.

Mr. Goldenfold blinked, bored or annoyed or indifferent - it was hard to tell - and gestured Rick should continue. Right there in front of everyone. Morty was sure Rick was grinning like the maniac he was but she was too busy trying to stare a hole through the floor so she could crawl into it and die.

“Morty won’t be able to answer your questions for a little while.” Rick’s agile fingers brushed her hair over her shoulder to show off the shock collar to full affect and Morty briefly wondered what would happen if she just curled up into a ball right there and gave up on life. What could anyone _really_ do to stop her? “She lost her voice in a science related mishap and now she’s _incommunicado_ until we sort some stuff out. But I didn’t want to keep her at home – didn’t seem fair to make her miss out on your – _eerup_ \- determined efforts to educ _-aaaugh_ -ate.”

“Class participation is a part of the grade…” Mr. Goldenfold answered like he was reading lines off a syllabus but after a slight pause he continued, “…but I also don’t really care so _go take your seat, Morty!_ ” He finished on a shout but Mr. Goldenfold loved shouting so his raised voice didn’t mean as much to Morty as the faces slowly turning to track her movement as she hurried to her seat. When she crammed herself into the desk, she caught Rick’s parting wave and wink from the hall before she buried her face in her arms and tried to shut out the vague murmuring already starting amongst her classmates.

 

* * *

 

As far as school days went, sitting in Mr. Goldenfold’s math class and feeling sweat gather on the skin underneath Rick’s collar was easily the all-time absolute worst in Morty history. And that was really saying something considering she had once burned down half the science room when she’d been too distracted looking at Jessica to follow along in class.

The hours had passed with her classmates - seemingly one by one, like they were taking turns – craning their necks around to gawk at her, their eyes unabashedly glued to the collar that connected her to Rick no matter where she went. And the curly headed jerk that sat behind her kept calling her ‘gwampa’s widdle gurl’ with a taunting, childish lisp like those words (minus the awful baby-voice) weren’t hard-wired to a completely different part of her brain and traitorously making her squirm for worse reasons than embarrassment.

Cause yeah, she fucking was. She knew it. Rick knew it. Now _everyone_ fucking knew it.

Morty had taken great pains to carefully maintain some semblance of being a normal kid when she showed up for classes. The ruse wasn’t _completely_ successful - she was still lonely and ostracized and made fun of – but she generally flew under the radar except for her relation to Rick, which mostly only meant students looking for weed would hit her up for the number to his burner phone.

After his interruption in class and the completely degrading hunk of metal at her throat, she had a feeling she’d be the topic of at least a few rounds of gossip.

By the third time the curly-haired kid leaned forward to whisper insults to her, she scribbled ‘ _Fuck. You._ ’ in letters big enough to take up a whole page of her notebook and turned it to face him. Unfortunately, he only seemed to think that was even funnier but his crass comments shifted from being Rick-centric to jeers about her inability to speak. Those were a lot easier to ignore.

When class was over, Mr. Goldenfold held her back and gave her an apathetic but long-winded reaming for her habitual tardiness alluding to at least two separate occasions that Morty had no memory of and could only assume they had actually been robot-Morty covering for her absence. She was so flustered by the way his eyes - whether intentionally curious or drawn by the small blinking lights - kept drifting down to her neck, that she didn’t bother to properly listen and when he finally stopped ranting to pull in a long breath, she’d scribbled, ‘ _sorry_ ’ on her notepad and ‘ _won’t happen again_ ’, flipping the sign towards him as she backed out the door.

The upside to Goldenfold’s lecture was that by the time she escaped into the hallway, most of Morty’s fellow flunkers had cleared out of school and only a handful of kids were left leaning against the lockers in little cliques.

Though lack of witnesses didn’t mean her collar went without notice and when she passed a group of older guys she vaguely recognized, one of them said, “ _Woah_ , what the fuck is that?” drawing the attention of the whole group, which it turned out, included Brad.

And Brad – who’s last interactions with Morty prior to the bunker was a new wave of aggression that hit midway through the fieldtrip after Jessica chose _Morty_ as her partner for the three-legged-race instead of him – tilted his lips up in a bright smile like Christmas just came early.

Face flaming, Morty hurried towards the exit, determined not to interact or even _glance_ in his direction lest set him off when Brad shouted, “Oh shit, looks like the Smith girl’s into some _freaky shit_!” loud enough that everyone left in the hall heard. There was the squeaky skid of sneakers on linoleum and then a hush as all eyes turned to Morty, lone and trembling and red-faced while she rushed through the hall. Since the floor didn’t seem likely to do Morty a major solid and split open to swallow her whole, she did the second best thing: quicken her pace and aim for the doors, the sounds of laughter and wolf-whistles licking at her feet.

Then someone stepped into her pathway, the _last_ person Morty wanted to run into while she was trapped in the most humiliating situation of her insanely pathetic life, and Morty had no choice but to screech to a halt or bowl Jessica right over. As it was, she still couldn’t decide between the two in time and she wound up colliding with her, bouncing off Jessica’s way-too-soft breasts, and losing her balance, sprawling backwards onto her butt.

Her poor tailbone _really_ couldn’t catch a break.

Morty’s mouth was already shaping ‘ _Oh jeez, I’m so sorry,_ ’ but she’d barely breathed out an “O –” before she clenched with the shock from the collar. Right in the middle of the school hallway. Right in front of _Jessica._ Her life was a cosmic fucking joke.

Luckily, the hours of silence she’d spent in math meant the shock was at the lowest possible setting and she was fairly sure she hadn’t done anything more embarrassing than cringe and grit her teeth. It might have even passed as a flinch from hitting the ground. Brad and his cronies at least didn’t seem to notice anything unusual - they were all in stitches over her supposed ( _actual_ ) sexual fetishes and the sight of her falling over. But Jessica was looking down at her pityingly and holding out a hand to help her up and Morty would have rather laid right there on the ground forever than have to face Jessica’s kindness because at that moment it felt so much more like ridicule.

“Cut it out, assholes,” Jessica snapped, tilting her head up to glare at the laughing boys. Brad and the two guys Morty thought of as his lackeys snapped their mouths shut at her command but the rest of the group only laughed harder.

“Jessica, are you okay?” Brad asked, all fake concern as he pushed away from his friends, his expensive basketball shoes coming to a stop inches from Morty’s splayed fingers and she snatched her hand away for fear he’d be tempted to crush them.

“Yeah, Brad, I’m fine,” Jessica answered, rolling her eyes. Morty wondered if she could army crawl away without attracting anymore unwanted attention but that idea was squashed when Jessica turned her face down to Morty and - since Morty wasn’t taking her outstretched hand - leaned over to grab her elbow and helped haul her to her feet.

It took a great deal of effort to stifle the stammering ‘ _oh_ ’ that wanted to blather out of her mouth at Jessica’s touch and the sudden head-rush from standing but she bit down hard on her lip and kept her inane noises to herself. “Are _you_ okay, Morty,” Jessica asked, bending over to pick up Morty’s dropped notebook, the massive ‘ _Fuck. You._ ’ flipped to the top page. And Morty was all too aware of Jessica’s eyes, darting around Morty’s features and settling (of course) right on the collar with a morbid sort of interest.

Of all the people in the multiverse Morty had hoped to avoid, Jessica was the top contender. _Jessica_ , who had admitted to thinking about kissing Morty, who had _almost_ kissed Morty, who had put her soft hand on Morty’s cheek just the day before yesterday and leaned in so close Morty could count the freckles on her cheeks. Perfect, _normal_ Jessica who would never let _anyone_ put a collar around her beautiful perfect neck let alone her own sick fuck of a grandfather - a collar that was at least partially some twisted retaliation for that almost-kiss with Jessica that Morty hadn’t had more than a few spare moments to dwell on since it happened.

But the damage was done and Morty tried to tell herself it was all in her imagination but she could _see_ something turning over in Jessica’s head as she studied the band of metal.

Again Morty had to stop herself from stuttering out an answer while humiliation boiled over in her stomach and spilled through every pore. She lowered her head and nodded, clutching the notebook to her chest like a shield.

“Do you see this shit, Jessica?” Brad asked and Morty didn’t need to look up to know he was talking about her and probably gesturing to her in some rude, awful way. “Look! She’s collared like a dog. You think she’s into it? Ha – hah, you think she likes this sort of shit?”

Brad’s laughter was Morty’s cue. Forcing herself to flash Jessica the most sincere smile she could (which felt more like a grimace than anything else) she darted around her and made a break for the school doors.

“Fuck off, Brad, she _obviously_ doesn’t…” Jessica bit out venomously but Morty only half heard her over the pounding of her own heart, the half-muted sentiment still stinging like a laser blast to the gut. _Walking_ would be smart – it would certainly attract less attention to herself – but she found herself half jogging towards the sunlight streaming in the glass doors that signified her freedom. She wasn’t even aware someone had fallen into step beside her until she burst out into the stifling summer heat and was taking big gulps of fresh, humid air.

“…don’t look so good, Morty,” Jessica’s voice finally filtered in through the panic and Morty jumped at how near it was to her side, her startled exhalation earning her another _stronger_ shock. When she unclenched, Jessica was looking at her like she was expecting some kind of answer but Morty hadn’t heard a question.

Dazed and wishing Jessica would just leave her alone and let her die of shame, Morty flipped open her notebook and scribbled ‘ _what_?’, turning it to Jessica and trying to hide her eagerness to run away.

“I heard what happened with Rick,” Jessica answered sounding sweet and understanding, but there she was, dropping Rick’s name again like she knew the guy, and Morty couldn’t quite understand the strange tide of discomfort and… _bitterness?_... that swept the sea of humiliation roiling inside her into a tsunami.

Morty had nothing to say to that – besides the fact that she couldn’t _say_ anything at all – so she blinked and tried not to look as pathetic as she felt.

“Trisha told me – about how you can’t talk or whatever,” Jessica continued and Morty couldn’t remember if Trisha was in her remedial math class or if that meant that somehow, news of her and Rick’s collar had already made the rounds. “I guess I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

Morty swiped at her forehead, already beading with sweat, and blew a silent sigh out between her lips.

No she was _not_ okay. She was a fucking _disaster_.

And someone like Jessica could _never_ understand.

Brad and his unobservant gang of sport-scholarship-dunces had glanced at her for a _second_ and figured out all the stuff she was most embarrassed about and spread it to the whole fucking school. And Jessica had waltzed in like a fucking angel and tried to defend Morty from the _truth_ because who Morty was and what she was into was so _disgusting_ that Jessica couldn’t even fathom the ugly depths of her soul. Because Jessica was sane and cared-for and well-liked – which was nothing like Morty who was one stray laser blast away from the fiery pits of hell.

Something almost like a laugh huffed out of Morty’s nose and she was grateful the collar didn’t find the noise disagreeable. ‘ _Yeah_ ’ she mouthed, nodding with her head and shoulders, doing her best to exude the kind of confidence that Rick always made look easy. She lifted up her notebook and wrote down a hasty sentence.

‘ _Thanks for worrying Jessica but I’ll be fine_.’

Jessica shifted her weight, emphasizing her curves by propping a fist up on her hip while she studied Morty with a furrowed brow. “I… this doesn’t have anything to with… me coming over, right?” She sheepishly asked, nibbling her lower lip between her teeth and drawing Morty’s attention to her mouth and the sheen of light pink lip gloss begging to be kissed away. “Rick… seemed pretty mad…”

Morty was sure her face was a mask of horror – her eyes too wide and her mouth popping open at the surprisingly astute observation Jessica had just thrown out like she might _know_ about Rick and the real motives behind the collar. And even though she tried to school her features into something else, _anything_ else, she knew she didn’t succeed when Jessica cringed a little.

“Yeah, I thought so. I texted you yesterday but you never got back to me.”

That startled Morty out of her stupor and she swung her backpack around, realizing too late that her phone had been in the front pocket for over a day, completely neglected. It wasn’t like anyone besides her family texted her and yesterday had been… full of distractions… so she hadn’t even needed it to set an alarm.

The screen lit up when she pulled it from her backpack and sure enough, three message notifications bearing Jessica’s name and the little red-headed girl emoji sprang up, overlaying… what was that? Was that a new background picture?

She swiped the text notifications out of the way and immediately blanched.

Morty _felt_ all the blood rush out of her face when she realized she was looking at herself - shirt rucked up to her armpits, Rick’s pallid hands cupping her breasts, her back arched and face rapturous where it turned to press into Rick’s neck. His electric eyes stared over her shoulder, right through the camera lens and into her soul.

He must have taken the photo during the threesome with robot-Rick – actually it looked more like robot-Rick had taken it, judging from the angle. She had no memory of that moment but then again, she’d been utterly lost to sensation the moment the second dick had eased inside of her so that wasn’t exactly a surprise.

And jeez, the two of them together were… to see his long, wiry build curving over her smaller, softer body… was that what they looked like? A traitorous spike of heat sparked to life between her legs and Morty swallowed heavily.

_And his eyes_ , jeez. She couldn’t stop staring at them.

The two of them like that – it was better than porn because Morty _remembered_ what it felt like to have him inside her, to be held up and filled to the brim and completely overwhelmed. She was getting a head rush just looking at the dazed pleasure painted across her face in broad strokes, Rick’s burning gaze cutting through her like he _knew_ what the picture would do to her.

“I didn’t mean to get you in trouble, Morty,” Jessica interrupted Morty’s complete mental shutdown, looking too sincere and too beautiful and too unreachable, eyes darting down to Morty’s phone. With a vicious mental shake, Morty slammed her consciousness back to the present, quickly dimmed the screen, and shoved it deep into her backpack with shaking hands, praying Jessica hadn’t seen the photo. “And, like, I’ve been thinking about the stuff Rick said and it’s not…” – Morty was so confused, so angry, so bizarrely turned on by the look on Rick’s face in that photo; the possessive gleam in his eyes that screamed ‘ _I own you, Morty_ ’ like he was speaking the words out loud - “I don’t want to _hurt_ you but maybe I shouldn’t have pressured you into something you didn’t want to do –”

And like that Morty was stretching out a hand and pulling Jessica in with a grip on the side of her neck, frantic and desperate and determined. She might have been a bit too rough – nothing like Jessica’s slow lean in and gentle touches the other day – but she was terrified that Rick would pop out of the bushes or Brad would step out the door or that _fucking volcano under Yellowstone would choose_ now _to erupt_ just to screw her over.

Jessica’s lips were soft. So deliciously soft and plush and they tasted like her strawberry lip gloss and the sweet coffee drink she must have drank somewhat recently. Even though Morty had to stand on her toes to reach, Jessica let her take the lead, Morty guiding her with the hand on her neck to tilt their head for a better angle until their mouths slotted together perfectly, firm but chaste.

When Morty broke off the kiss, she held still a moment, eyes closed, forehead pressing against Jessica’s, trying to memorize the moment. She breathed a long sigh out her nose and let her fingers skim through Jessica’s silky hair _just once_ before she lowered herself off her toes and stepped back, giving Jessica some space.

Morty couldn’t quite meet Jessica’s round wide eyes as she flipped back to the page in her notebook that read ‘ _sorry_ ’ and held it up.

“No I’m –” Jessica seemed a little breathless, her hand hovering over her own lips, and Morty couldn’t decide if the dazed look clouding her green eyes was good or bad.

She flipped her notebook to a fresh page and scribbled, ‘ _sorry I didn’t text back. I’m not in trouble, I just_ ’ her hand stalled for a moment, ‘ _made a stupid mistake._ ’ Morty turned it to face Jessica and watched her eyes scan across the words, gesturing with her pen to her collar and rolling her eyes in self-disgust she didn’t need to fake.

Morty didn’t want to do it, didn’t want to write it down, but she knew it was the best way to reassure Jessica and Morty needed to leave – _now_ – before she started crying.

‘ _Rick’ll fix me up_.’

Still, even her _hand_ stuttered over the name and the ‘R’ was a little crooked. She tried not to cringe when she tilted the notebook and showed Jessica what she’d written.

And just like Morty knew she would, Jessica nodded and huffed out a little relieved laugh of her own. “Right,” she conceded, smiling and knocking her knuckles against her temple in a painfully endearing ‘ _I’m so stupid_ ’ kind of gesture than almost broke Morty’s heart. “Yeah cuz Rick’s, like, a _genius_.” Everyone around town knew that about him. A lot less people knew he was a monster, too. “I’d offer to give you a ride but the debate team has practice…” Jessica added, glancing back at the school and looking genuinely torn. It wasn’t so hard for Morty to force a smile when she shook her head and waved her off, the gesture a little exaggerated because she’d been reduced to playing charades. “But um – text me, Morty, okay?”

Morty let her head jerk in a stiff nod and scanned over Jessica’s pale, freckled cheeks where they were tinged a little pink. Jessica’s mouth curved up in a soft smile when she turned to give Morty a friendly wave while she dashed back into the school.

When she’d disappeared inside, Morty let her head loll back on her shoulders and breathed out a sigh heavy enough to set off the collar, for once actually relishing the stinging shock because the pain helped ground her in reality when she felt like she was trapped in a dream.

She had kissed Jessica. _Morty Smith_ had kissed _Jessica._ Their lips had touched – the lips Morty had been fantasizing about _forever_ had pressed against Morty’s mouth and _kissed back_.

And yeah, it had been nice. Kissing was nice and _Jessica_ was nice. Morty was a big fan of both.

…

“ _Fuck_.” She breathed the word out loud and reveled in the pain that she so deeply deserved.

Morty stared blankly at the big puffy white clouds drifting by above her, squinting against the sun even as it burned a faded purple aura into her vision that she still saw when she closed her eyes.

‘ _Don’t even think it_ ,’ she mentally chided herself, the sting of tears teasing at the back of her throat. ‘ _Don’t, Morty - if you don’t think about it, it isn’t real_ ’.

The long breath she exhaled quavered like a sob.

Kissing Jessica was _nice_. She smelled good. And even though she was taller than Morty, she wasn’t at such an absurd height that Morty had need to strain to reach her. And her face had been smooth and soft. Not to mention her hair – _jeez_ – it was just as silky as Morty always thought it would be, not coarse and wiry or – _fuck_.

But…

_Don’t Morty_ …

But it wasn’t…

_Don’t even_ think _it, you_ stupid _fucking_ …

But it wasn’t _anything_ like kissing Rick.


	18. Chapter Eighteen

Morty hated herself. She hated herself so _so_ much, if she opened her mouth and started screaming, she wondered if the shocks from the collar would ever get strong enough to send her into cardiac arrest.

Because kissing Jessica was supposed to be _amazing_ \- it was supposed to set off those sparks that lit her up every time Rick ducked his head down and laced his fingers through her hair and tilted her neck until he could devour her whole. Kissing Jessica was supposed to light her whole body on fire and make her writhe with feelings and send her spinning into a sea of sensation the way she exploded into stardust when Rick’s lips met hers.

But none of that happened. It was just a kiss. A _nice_ kiss, sure. But nothing special.

Even Rick’s wet and chaste forehead pecks ignited more heat in Morty’s belly than the soft press of Jessica’s strawberry flavored mouth. M

orty fisted the star pendant through her t-shirt and sighed.

Life wasn’t fair.

The sound of stifled laughter broke Morty out of her thoughts – a trio of girls had just pushed their way out of the school building and were trying to cover their giggles with their hands, tittering amongst themselves - probably over how stupid Morty looked; the sunlight glinting off her collar, her blanched, desperate face turned up to the blaring sun. Morty blinked at them dolefully and for the first time was glad the collar spared her from the urge to stammer out some sort of embarrassing excuse, hurrying to the sidewalk to begin her walk home.

With a sigh she felt down to her very toes, Morty begrudgingly pulled out her phone, lighting up the screen and gaping at the photo Rick must have set as her background – petty retaliation for her erasing the one with her lips around his cock. She _tried_ not to think about the fact that just _looking_ at that picture inspired more heat inside of her than her kiss with Jessica but the comparison was impossible to avoid and she angrily resolved to be rid of the damn thing.

She swiped open her phone and pulled up the settings app, feeling an irrational boost of victory when the image of Rick leering at the camera and playing her body like a fucking instrument was replaced with a generic, calming blue cloud swirl. There. _Take that_ , Rick.

As if he heard her thoughts through time and space, her phone gave a pointed little buzz and the cloud image blinked out of existence, replaced again by the picture of her and Rick, the pale line of robot-Rick’s cock just _barely_ visible disappearing between her legs.

What the…? How did he even…?

She rolled her eyes at herself. He was _Rick_. He could do _anything_. She pulled up the settings again - more out of principle than anything else - only to discover that the wallpaper tab had been completely removed. She slowed to stop, staring at her phone in confusion and scrolling up and down the settings list at least three times before she groaned and accidentally shocked herself again.

Okay _fine_ , there was another way to change her fucking background. She pulled open the photo app and picked something at random; a picture of a cat whose coloring made it look like it had a unibrow. She had found it during her lunchbreak and was going to send it to Rick but had decided she was too pissed to initiate a text conversation and saved it for later because mad or not, the resemblance was too funny to ignore.

But try as she might, the usual ‘use as wallpaper’ option refused to pop up. She jerked to a halt in the middle of sidewalk and tried everything she could think of – other pictures, googled shortcuts, turning off and restarting her goddamn phone – but still, the picture staring back at her through her mesh of apps was always her blissed out, flushed look of euphoria and Rick’s hard gleam of a stare devouring her through time and space.

Awesome. She was stuck with the picture of her and Rick _mid-threesome_ as her background. Great. She’d have to be extra careful with her phone now – make sure she never left it around where mom or Summer could find it. Coolsies. How convenient.

God, she should have just stayed in bed.

She glared once more at her illuminated lock screen, a terrible curl of wetness slicking her folds. It really _was_ better than porn. And worse yet, her anger was dimming with the heat that threatened to overwhelm her sensibilities but she shook her head, determinedly telling herself it was only the scorching summer sun making her so hot as she begrudgingly shuffled her feet, continuing on her way home.

Before the gas station that marked the midway point came into view, Morty _knew_ Rick would be there waiting for her with a sort of certainty that bordered on clairvoyance. Not that he made a habit of loitering there – no if he wanted her after school, he usually waited for her in the garage, portaled into the school and dragged her off, or crashed the ship into her path on the walk home. Though honestly, it was hard to say what was _usual_ anymore; Rick didn’t abide by many patterns and things stopped making sense to Morty the moment she pulled away from Jessica disappointed.

Whatever the case, Rick was leaned against the blank wall of the gas station facing the street, a brown paper bag wrapped around a bottle in one hand and sunglasses shading his eyes from the bright light. He looked cool and casual in a way Morty envied – even standing so close to the dumpster in heat thick enough to see – and the effect tripled when he tilted his head down to peer at her over the top of his shades.

“Have fun at school, Morty?” He tipped the not-very-well-disguised vodka bottle to his smirking lips and even though he was being a jerk and had put her through hell and she was still very _very_ mad at him, she walked right up to him and wrapped her arms around his thin waist, burying her head against his sweater. He stiffened briefly before he relaxed into the hold, dropping his brown paper bag and accompanying liquor into one of his pockets so he could wrap both his arms around her shoulders and squeeze her back.

After all that had happened - after the ups and downs, after a day of looking at so many faces and feeling like a glass wall kept her apart, after throwing herself against that wall the hardest she ever had, stretching up on her toes and kissing what turned out to be a half-formed reflection – _she really needed a hug_.

And if Rick was the only one likely to give her one (and the one she craved it from the most anyways) she wasn’t gonna let herself feel weird about it.

Too aware that they were on earth and in public and that Summer was friendly with the cashier of the gas station, Morty let Rick go sooner than she would if they were at home, but it was hot and she was sweaty so she told herself it was for the best.

Standing in the long shadow he cast, Morty let some of the tension melt from her shoulders and twisted open her notebook. ‘ _I’m done with school_ ’ she wrote out and flipped it over to show Rick.

“That bad, huh bud?” Rick asked, and even though he sounded sympathetic, he didn’t sound _sorry_ because he probably wasn’t. He ruffled her hair gently before he turned away from the wall he’d been leaning against and led the way home, Morty easily falling into step beside him. “Gonna let Morty-bot take over for you for good?”

Morty shrugged. She didn’t care. She was over it all, over _everything_ , time to lean into the truth she’d been avoiding for the last year and throw herself into the irregular, fantastical life she could lead if she didn’t try so hard pretending to be _normal_.

It was rare of Rick to walk anywhere – even when he was blackout drunk, he made the reckless decision to drive or fly or portal wherever he needed to get to – and Morty couldn’t imagine _why_ he was so content walking around the neighborhood, waving at people he hated while they walked their dogs and watered their lawns - until Morty noticed how much attention he was actively drawing to her and the collar around her neck. He’d slung an arm over her shoulder and she watched every curious pair of eyes settle on Rick – openly drinking from his brown paper bag and smiling uncharacteristically chipper – and then slide along his arm to settle on the metal around her throat.

He was showing the collar off. To the _neighborhood_. And everyone was so used to the strange man who flew a spaceship and could open up green glowing doorways to other places that Morty could practically read their acceptance of the hunk of technology she now wore around her neck on their stupid, friendly faces.

Morty felt ridiculous and weirdly overlooked, even when neighbors did double-takes as they walked past, straining to get a second glance at the collar straight out of a bad dystopian sci-fi flick. And by the time her and Rick passed the third person walking a dog, Morty wondered how far off from that the two of them were (aided by Brad’s words ‘ _She’s collared like a dog_ ’ echoing endlessly in her head).

So it was a relief to get home.

For a couple hours, the two of them hung out in the garage, her handing him the tools he needed and reliving the kiss from every possible angle, turning it over and over in her head, while Rick rambled to himself (because it wasn’t like she could answer), getting progressively more drunk and frustrated though she hadn’t pinned down what was making him upset.

When mom messaged to say she’d be getting dinner out with her coworkers, Rick manhandled Morty through a portal and out onto a bustling street fair on another planet. Or at least Morty _assumed_ it was another planet – the sky was a bleak green/grey and the buildings were oddly blocky – but the popcorn lights and festival booths reminded Morty of the carnival that came to town every summer.

Though the winding avenues were bustling with lifeforms, Morty found herself much less self-conscious about the collar. It still attracted attention – one alien’s eyes spun on their antennae to follow her for at least half a block – but surrounded by tentacle monsters and fish people and what looked like a miniature giraffe wearing spectacles, Morty’s couldn’t even be sure it _was_ the collar that caught their attention or if she was just another strange creature in the crowd.

After they snagged a couple corndogs (of all the fucking things to get on another planet - but Rick claimed they were the best in the galaxy), Rick led the way through winding, tightly packed streets, making their way uphill until they came across an open space with a collection of big rocks that looked vaguely intentionally stacked. A few of the multi-legged creatures most prominent on the streets were climbing and sitting along the rough emerald stone and Morty and Rick scrambled to an unoccupied ledge. Rick thrust his corndog at her and offered his linked fingers which she stepped into automatically and without question.

Once he’d hefted her onto a rocky overlook, he pulled himself up after her, grinning like a little kid. As usual, his smile – the real one - inspired one of her own and some of the aggravation that had built up over the course of the day siphoned out of her dangling feet.

After all, _this_ was why she put up with him even though he made riding that knife edge of raving lunacy look easy. From their higher perch, Morty could watch peacefully as aliens of every shape, size, and color wandered past, living lives Morty couldn’t even begin to imagine. The last rays of sunlight hit the stone piles, making them glisten in undulating ripples like the surface of a pool. It was gorgeous and strange and to think her life had turned into _this_ when a few years ago, the most interesting thought she had to worry about was whether her parents would ever suck it up and get a divorce.

It _still_ blew her mind.

She huffed out a small, almost derisive chuff which her collar seemed to allow and shook her head, taking a bite of her corndog and rolling her eyes back, only _just_ stopping herself from moaning at the taste because she didn’t want to choke mid-shock. Rick hadn’t been wrong. How could a _corndog_ taste so good?

Rick snatched his own back and studied her out of the corner of his eye but Morty was too interested in looking at the lights from the street fair, spread out below them like a river of color to acknowledge his persistent staring.

“Alright, alright,” he eventually broke her absent thoughts by grumbling. He stuffed the corndog in his mouth and held it with his teeth while he quickly tapped at his watch until the collar let out its familiar tinny beep. “’fere,” he said around the food in his mouth and Morty turned to frown at him in confusion. His teeth clamped down - taking half his corndog off the stick with one massive bite - and he rolled his eyes at her while he chewed. “You’re free to talk.” He waved his hand magnanimously and Morty took another bite of her own dinner, glaring at him distrustfully.

He laughed at that, nearly choking on the massive chunk of food in his mouth, but he coughed once, wiped his mouth on the back of his sleeve, and reiterated, “Honestly Morty, I’m not fucking with you. Go ahead.”

Still not at _all_ convinced this wasn’t Rick’s idea of a joke, Morty cleared her throat – a blessed relief after nearly twenty-four hours of feeling like she had to cough – and was mildly surprised she didn’t feel the accompanying shock from the collar. Rick waggled his eyebrow at her like he was saying ‘ _told you so_ ’ and she immediately put her cleared throat to use by announcing, “You are _such_ a dick-bag, Rick,” as dead-flat serious as she could manage while holding a fucking corndog and sitting cross-legged on a big green rock.

Rick positively erupted into laughter and she hated - _hated -_ how much the sound of his joy always made her want to join in on the joke. Fighting hard at the knee-jerk reaction, her mouth traitorously curved, just a little, and she tried to smother it back down before Rick saw and thought he was off the hook. “No really, Rick, you – you’re just a big, fat bag of dicks.” She wasn’t trying to be funny but Rick was rolling around, clutching his sides as his guffaws turned to almost silent gasps and the noises he was making attracted confused looks from other creatures climbing around on the rocks. “I – I can’t believe you – you – you _dick-bag_ ,” she asserted one more time, trying to concisely express her opinion while avoiding being too charmed by the way Rick was wiping away tears and looking at her like she was the best thing that ever happened to him.

“Oh – oh Morty,” he crowed once he had got his breathing back under control and pushed himself back up to sit next to her. “Jeezus that’s – you’re just,” he leaned over and kissed her temple hard – his lips smacking loudly so close to her ear – and Morty shoved him away and swiped at her hair to make sure he hadn’t left any mustard behind.

She was doing her best to scowl at him but he looked so smitten, his lined face so unusually soft that for a moment she considered letting go of her anger in the hopes that he’d keep his good mood. But (for once) her anger won out. “I’m serious Rick - this is a new low.”

Rick seemed unfazed by her comment, taking another big bite and chewing with his mouth open. “Morty, you have _no idea_.”

That sent shivers racing down her spine, half in terror, half in an animalistic response to the deep, growling pitch of his voice. But now wasn’t the time to be ruled by her vagina; now was the time to get answers. Who knew if she’d get the chance again anytime soon.

Morty’s voice quavered a bit when she stammered out, “And – and what did you do to Summer? Is she – you didn’t replace her with that robot or – or something, right?”

Rick’s sharp eyes snapped to hers and he shrugged. “Don’t worry about it, Morty.”

“Don’t –” Full disclosure wasn’t really his habit but it was rare Rick avoided a direct question. That he was trying to keep her in the dark only set her mind spiraling in the worst directions she could imagine. _Had_ Rick replaced Summer with her robot? _Was_ she locked up in the bunker or somewhere else? Had he killed the original Summer all just to cover up Morty’s one tiny little slip up?

The world blurred as she started to hyperventilate. “Rick, don’t - don’t give me that ‘ _don’t worry about it_ ’ shit!” she bit out, her voice high and strained. “ _I - I’m- I’m worried_ , okay?!”

Rick dragged the very last bite of his corndog off the stick and hurried to lean up and wrap his arm around her shoulder. “Jeez, _okay_ , okay. Calm down,” he urged, his palm soothing down her back and when she half glared up at him through her teary eyelashes, he rolled his eyes dramatically. “She’s _fine_ Morty, relax. I just erased a couple minutes of her memory.”

Morty sighed in relief and then blinked in quick succession. “You _what_?!”

“You told her something you shouldn’t have, Morty,” he reminded her and she barely staved off a flinch. He swung one of his legs around her back to sit behind her and when he pressed his broad palm against her sternum, it plastered her back against his chest. She felt his torso expand with adeep even inhale and she tried to match her breathing to his.

In… out. In… _erased her memories?..._ out.

His voice was soothing and light when he continued, “I just took that moment back. Like a computer, Morty, I went in and deleted the file. Nothing else is damaged, she’s still ‘ _your sister_ ’,” Morty heard more than saw another eye-roll, “(whatever the fuck _that_ means in a multiverse _filled_ with other Summers) - And Summer-bot’s still in her locker in the bunker. I just made Summer forget those few minutes when you tried so hard to fuck everything up.”

Rick had erased Summer’s memories. _Huh._ She didn’t know Rick had that sort of technology. She’d never seen him do anything like that before and she knew what most of his inventions were capable of. And a memory wiper; that could come in handy. But… was she crazy or hadn’t she heard of something like that before?

Then it clicked.

“What – so kinda like those Rics were gonna do to you?” The deep rise of Rick’s chest faltered and Morty almost regretted bring it up. The Rics were always a sore subject and she’d pieced together enough about Rick’s strange fake-heart attack in his cell at the Palisade to guess that the idea of having his memory tampered with _really_ upset him – upset him enough to lose his cool which took _a lot_ \- but Rick prided himself on his brain so it made sense he didn’t want anyone messing with it. Morty just couldn’t believe he’d taken that idea and made a device of his own without telling her about it. “You figured it out too…”

“‘ _Figured it_ –’ _Morty_ ,” he shoved at her until she had turned in the space between his legs so he could face her, ducking his head to glare pointedly eye-to-eye with her. “Don’t say ‘ _figured it out_ ’ like it was _hard.”_

It was her turn to roll her eyes. “ _Jeez_ , Rick…”

“I can do anything those bitches can do, only _better_.” Yup. Definitely still a sore subject.

But ignoring Rick’s childish one-upmanship tendencies, the relief of knowing Summer was safe left Morty nearly boneless.

And the addition of a memory gun would be… useful. The threat of being found out didn’t need to hang over her head quite so heavily and minor mistakes (which Morty was unfortunately prone to making) wouldn’t result in someone else being shipped off to wherever the fuck dad… wait…“How long ago did you –” _No. But if he could have… why_ would he… “ _How long have you been able to do that_? Rick – _what about dad_?!”

She was gasping for air again and she wasn’t sure when she had shoved him over and shifted up to her knees or where the half eaten remains of her corndog had disappeared to but Rick’s lapels were in her fists and she was practically nose to nose with him, frantic with desperation.

“What about him?” Rick replied and his voice was dangerous and hard but Morty couldn’t bring herself to care about that.

“Jeez, can we – can we get him _back_?” If dad came back, if Rick could just erase that night dad had walked in on them nearly fucking in Rick’s room – hell erase the whole time he’d been gone just to keep things simple – Morty wouldn’t have to carry that around with her like a weight dragging her down under choppy waters. She wouldn’t have to feel _guilty_ anymore. She could, at least in that tiny little way, go back to being a regular kid. “Can’t we bring him back and erase everything and – and go back to normal – like things used to be?”

Morty read the answer on Rick’s carefully emotionless face and the hope that had bubbled up so suddenly burst, leaving behind an empty cavern below her lungs.

“Why would I do that, Morty?” he asked rhetorically, his hands wrapping around hers where they still clung to his lab coat. “Better question: why would you _want_ me to?”

Wasn’t it obvious? “Because I –”

“And don’t tell me you miss him, Morty,” he interrupted harshly, his fingers tightening around hers, “cause I _know_ that’s a load of shit.”

Oh jeez, Rick knew. He could read her mind, _of course_ he _knew._ “I – I do too –” she started to stammer but Rick spoke over her weak, crumbling assertion.

“ _No you don’t_.” Rick’s voice was a hiss in her ear, the whisper she heard in the back of her own head, the sound of dark, locked places and hidden sinkholes. “You _think_ you should miss him but you don’t. What’s there to miss?”

Part of her wanted to cry but another part of her kept chanting, ‘ _he’s right he’s right he’s right he’s right_ ’ in a voice she couldn’t mistake as anyone’s but her own. She _didn’t_ miss dad. Not in the ways that mattered. She felt _guilty_ and _responsible_ and _regretful_ – she hadn’t meant to get him wrapped up with Rick in such a terrible way, didn’t want to bear the knowledge that it was _her fault_ – but… _she didn’t miss him_.

Rick must have read her torn-up feelings on her face because his teeth flash wickedly and his voice was soft velvet when he cupped her cheek and touched their foreheads together, “It’s nothing to feel bad about, Morty. Beth and Summer – everyone’s happier now, aren’t they?”

They might _seem_ that way but… it wasn’t like she could _ask_. She could _never_ ask. “I don’t –”

“They _are_ and you know it, Morty. _And you are too_.” Her eyes darted up to his - ice blue and frosty. She was close enough to see the flecks of silver in his right pupil. “You’ve got so much more freedom now that Jerry isn’t nagging you to do his chores or whining until you give him pity or invading your privacy when he’s lonely.”

“ _Rick_ -” Why was Rick always _right_?

“ _I’m_ happier too, Morty, doesn’t that matter to you?” There was nothing she could possibly say to that – _of course_ his happiness mattered to her but did it matter more than another man’s life on earth? Or maybe even just _another man’s life_. Rick had promised her – she’d made him _promise_ not to hurt dad and Rick didn’t make a habit of _lying_ to her – but even if he did, she’d never _know_.

And jeezus, if dad was… ( _dead_ )… because of her…

She let go of Rick and fell back, giving into the day-long urge to lay down and bask in her own pathetic-ness. She covered her face with her hands and breathed out a long, furious sigh. She heard the metallic sound of Rick unscrewing his flask and she wondered how long he’d let her lay here like this because ideally, it would be forever.

It turned out to be a lot less than that. “Morty, if you’re just gonna sit there silent and angry, I may as well turn the collar back on.” But he was back to playing the part of regular-old Rick, nothing sinister in his voice or venom sicky-sweet lacing his words. He didn’t even sound like he was likely to carry out on his threat.

And she knew it was a bad idea, knew she shouldn’t throw that shit back in his face, but she utterly lacked the strength for self-preservation. “Well, what did you – why’d you turn it off in the first place, Rick?”

He waited to answer until she’d lowered her hands and tilted her head to face him. Half his eyebrow was quirked up and that unmistakable affection was back to painting his features into something younger and kinder and Morty couldn’t understand how her heart could still flip-flop for a man she knew was such a raging tyrant.

“Like I said Morty, I didn’t want to punish _myself_ this time.”

Morty turned her head to gape at him, mouth unselfconsciously hanging open and Rick looked smug but sincere. “W- wait. Did you just…?”

“You say a bunch of stupid shit, Morty,” he talked over her in a rush like he was a little embarrassed at his own candor, “but some of it’s pretty funny.”

She bolted upright, a traitorous smile threatening to split her face and even though she _knew_ she shouldn’t stop being mad at him, words like that – such open appreciation for something besides her brainwaves or her willingness to let him fuck her brains out or her ability to shoot people who were trying to kill him – were an actual miracle. She couldn’t have stopped the huff of laughter from gasping out of her mouth if her life depended on it. “Did you actually – you fucking _admit_ it - you _like_ talking to me!” She had been aiming to sound confident but it was too breathy with disbelief.

“What, did you think I’d put up with you if I didn’t?” he asked, leaning back and surveying her with obvious fondness tinged with that ‘ _are you really that stupid_ ’ look that he somehow made endearing. And honestly, Morty _hadn’t_ been sure but it made sense, in a way – Rick didn’t do anything he didn’t want to, that was for fucking sure. But admitting he actively liked her company… that was worth marking down on a calendar.

Then Morty blinked and remembered the family dinner last night and the day she spent at school and the collar still wrapped around her neck – even if it wasn’t currently shocking her.

“Then take this off,” she tried to demand but her voice wavered, fingers grabbing at the metal around her neck while Rick’s pupils blew out into black pools.

“No way, Morty. Like I said, you’ve gotta learn.” He pulled his flask from his breast pocket and took a long sip. “I’m the only person you’ve got worth talking to anyways, buddy.”

God, wasn’t that some sick sort of truth. The whole multiverse was full of people but the only one who mattered was sitting next to her.

But that didn’t give him the right to collar her – didn’t give him the right to take away her voice. And if he was going to play games, she could too. She was sick of being obedient, sick of being _meek_. So instead of letting that gaping pit of despair swallow her up, she imitated the little head tilt Rick liked to do when he was feeling self-righteous and tried to be bold.

“No – no way, Rick, that’s not…”

“Not _what_ , Morty? What are you going to do about it?”

Jeez, what she could she _possibly_ say? How could she gain the upper hand on a _god_? She had absolutely nothing to barter with, nothing that she could keep from him, there was no part of her he couldn’t take.

Except… well… there was one thing. _Fuck, it was risky_ , Morty stood to lose _everything_ and it might all be for nothing but it was the only thing she’d never thought, never even _imagined,_ she’d have to use to threaten him.

“I’m not going to fuck you until you take it off.”

Had she honestly just said that out loud? And without a single stutter to undermine her seriousness? _Wow_.

A strange, displaced sort of calm came over her, like she was floating above the sea of lights on a cloud instead of the hard green rock rooting her to the strange planet. She felt _serene_ when she quirked her eyebrows at Rick and leaned back on her hands, mirroring Rick’s cool, indifferent posture as best she could while her heart pounded like a drum behind her rib cage. She spun her wrist until the topaz stone on her bracelet pressed against her palm and prepared herself for the worst.

But Rick was anything but indifferent. The fondness she so loved slid off his face and his spine went stiff as he leaned towards her, curling a leg up like he was thinking about pouncing on her right there to prove a point.

“Who says you get a say in that, _Moooorty_?” he seethed and _there_ was the monster – not at all unfamiliar to Morty though usually its anger wasn’t aimed _at her_.

“I do,” she answered simply, in the carefully neutral voice that always threw him off his game, even though it would be so much easier to swallow her anger and say ‘ _I’m sorry_ ’.

“Since when does what _you_ want matter?” he bit out between his uneven teeth but some of that rock solid confidence that normally turned his sharp features to stone cracked away. His sparkler-bright eyes bounced around her face, searching for a chink – a weakness - but she refused to waver, tilting her head and furrowing her brow; doing her best to convey the disappointment she usually didn’t let herself feel with her eyes alone.

“It _always_ has, Rick. Even you know that.” And it was true. She’d wanted it, every single time. Even the times he was rough and fierce, even the times he was angry, even that time he bent her over down in the bunker and refused to touch her more than he had to. She _always_ wanted Rick. It was an addiction.

And even if he was… problematic ( _to say the least_ )… when it came to consent, the deep scowl marring his face told her he’d received the message, loud and clear. Morty had never drawn a line in their relationship before. She’d never set any boundaries before – she was usually all too happy to give herself over into his far more capable hands – she’d never said ‘no’ or ‘stop’ or ‘don’t’ before. Though there was very little she _could_ do to stop him if he decided that didn’t matter.

From the way his gaze traveled over her lasciviously, she was fairly sure he was thinking the same thing. Probably even picturing it; the two of them right there on that rock, spectators be damned. The sun had gone down and their ledge was dark enough that they might not be spotted – then again, Morty suspected Rick _liked_ to be seen – wrestling her down, holding her in place, slamming into her. Morty shivered just imagining it.

But Morty was being serious. And Rick, who could practically read her mind, _knew it._

After what had to be the longest, most intense stare-off they’d ever had (Rick’s glower seemingly determined to melt her face off to inspect the muscles and bones below) he scoffed, eyes narrowing into slits while he leaned back and put on a façade of casualness.

“Tch. I’ll make you want it, Morty,” he shrugged, a smile playing at the corner of his eyes – and Morty realized that somehow a switch had been turned and _he was having fun_. “You already do. I bet you’re thinking about me yanking down your pants and plowing you right here and now.”

Jeez, he was definitely a mind-reader. She flushed but held her ground. “Yeah well – I’m serious, Rick.”

He leaned forward and brushed a cool thumb over the place on her cheek that felt hottest. “I’m gonna make you beg me for it, Morty,” he breathed, his grin stretching. “You won’t last a week.”

“I’ve gone longer,” Morty reminded him. That month and a half in the bunker, the long hours of frustration, the desperation to be touched; the memory of all those aching days of isolation climbed out of the hole she had tried to bury them in and her heart hurt to remember.

Except… except he’d been deprived then too according to robot-Rick. And consider the dark glower tugging down his brow, Rick wasn’t any happier with that reminder than she was.

“Di- _eeeugh_ -fference is, _Moooorty_ , I can jack off. What are you gonna do when you get all hot and bothered?”

She turned and cut him a look that she hoped was condescending. “Yeah but your – is your fist as good as my mouth, Rick?” She pulled her legs over the ledged and scooted closer to him on her knees. “Does it clench around you as – as tight as my cunt?” His eyes darkened as she approached, the shrinking space between their chests sparking with kinetic charge. She lowered her voice, trying to be sultry, _straining_ herself not to stutter when she rubbed her cheek along his to whisper, “Can your hand beg, ‘ _Fuck me, grandpa_ ’ when you pound into it?” directly into his ear.

The shuddering gasp Rick breathed out was exquisite.

She knew she’d be in for a long haul – Rick was stubborn and a jackass and he _really_ hated losing – but he kept coming back to her for a reason, right? And with what robot-Rick had divulged, she wasn’t as worried that her refusal would send him stumbling into the arms of someone else, even if it was definitely still a possibility – one that stung just to think of.

But if this was the line she was going to cling to, she’d dig her fingers down into bedrock and hold on tight.

Rick tried to catch her arm when she pulled away but she raised an eyebrow at him and he swore vehemently under his breath and ran a hand down his face.

“Ohhh, you’re going to regret that, Morty,” he promised, his voice rough, but she didn’t miss the playful edge he hadn’t bothered hiding. He _was_ having fun. He found her desperate stand _entertaining_. She couldn’t decide whether she should be grateful it hadn’t inspired more anger or whether she was pissed he was taking it so lightly.

Whatever the case, it wasn’t hard for her to summon a competitive edge when she scoffed, “It’s on, old-timer.”

He rolled to his feet, his jaw still clenched tight enough she could hear his teeth grinding even as he pseudo-calmly dusted the dirt from his pants. With a tap at his watch, he gave her a tight grin and when she realized what he was doing, her ‘ _No wait_!’ got cut down to “No-!” and a jolt of electricity shot through her like a spike. She scowled, pissed he hadn’t given her any warning, but of the things Rick could and _had_ done to her, it was hardly the worst.

He held out a hand to her (impatiently) and when she slipped her fingers through his, he yanked her to her feet and shoved her through a portal.

She landed on his bed.

Her mouth opened to protest and thankfully, before she could shock herself, Rick reassured her, “I’ll wait till you beg, Morty,” his words a challenge.

Instead of tackling her like she half expected him to do, he pulled off his lab coat and climbed along her body slowly, each place they touched coming alive. His knee slotted between her legs and Morty had to curl her lips into her mouth to remind herself not to make any noise.

Then he was kissing her like he was trying to break her will with his lips alone.

And if she thought her kiss with Jessica was lackluster earlier, it was _nothing_ compared to the feelings Rick’s mouth against hers inspired in every cell of her body. Their tongues battled, his teeth rough where he nibbled her already swollen lips, a fist in her hair keeping her pinned to him and pried open with an unrelenting grip.

Jeez did her know her well. It took a great deal of effort to keep herself from moaning under his tongue.

By the time Rick rolled off of her and slotted pitch black eyes down to glare at her, she was a panting writhing mess.

“Still think you’ll hold out, _Mooorty_?” he breathed against her mouth, licking and sucking at her lower lip and palming her breasts through her shirt.

She blinked placidly up at him but carefully didn’t give him anything that would be a go-ahead even though she was sure her face was flushed and her pupils blown out and she couldn’t stop staring at his mouth.

He sighed and then laughed in quick succession, rolling off of her and rummaging around in the bedside table until he found a bottle of liquor and started chugging from it. When he turned back to her, it seemed like his thoughts were turned inside of himself instead of on her even though she was flushed and still trying to catch her breath.

“If you’re gonna be like that, guess you get to sleep in your own bed, buddy,” he bit out, eyes on the middle distance before he stood up and swept to the door, opening it and gesturing grandly out to the hall.

And okay, _that_ stung. She hadn’t slept alone since the bunker – hadn’t slept in her own bed at all since then, honestly, except for the occasional nap she snagged in the middle of the day when Rick was still passed out and she didn’t want to risk waking him up. She’d gotten way too used to sleeping with him, had long ago grown dependent on his company to keep the nightmares away. But he _wanted_ her to give up and knowing that was his motivation made it easier to pull a shroud of feigned disinterest over her face as she sat up, straightened her rumpled clothes, smoothed down her hair, and walked out past Rick. His eyes tracked hers all the way to the foyer, even as he lifted the bottle to take another sip, and when she was halfway up the stairs, she heard his door slam closed.

It was hard to say who won that round. Rick wasn’t happy but neither was she. And if she had a bad dream and dragged herself down to his bed in the middle of the night only to be refused entry, she wasn’t so sure her heart could take it. Crawling into bed with him was usually one of the best parts of her day and he’d targeted that weakness with laser precision.

After a brief moment where she allowed herself to feel neglected and hurt, she breathed out a long sigh and did her best to shake it off. If anything, his temper tantrum was a good sign. Morty was _used_ to being hurt – most days her feelings were trampled on at least partially before breakfast – and if _that_ was the worst Rick could do, holding out would be easy. And compared to Rick who got everything he wanted pretty much the second the desire manifested itself, she had a lifetime of patience to back her up. She could handle a night alone but Rick was so greedy and selfish, being denied would drive him crazy.

When she pulled on pajamas (jeez, when was the last time she’d worn those) and crawled into her own bed, the sheets smelled strangely clean and stale – unused – and she had a brief moment of grief over losing the comforting smell of Rick’s bed and the way his covers smelled like both their skin. She prodded at the collar to remind herself to be strong before her hands drifted down, finding the pendant at her sternum instinctively and clutching it tight.

She had to be strong. Because if she gave Rick _everything_ , there would be nothing left of her.

 

* * *

 

 

Much later - after she’d killed her phone scrolling through reddit and staring at the painfully arousing picture set as her background, after she’d given up on finding a charger in her room without turning on the lights, after she’d laid back down in her bed and looked blankly through the dark with almost blind eyes, a fist wrapped around the star pendant strung around her neck to block out it’s soft, warm glow - her bedroom door creaked open.

Uneven footsteps stumbled towards her and she braced herself for getting dragged out of bed or tackled with a knife but Rick – _reeking_ of vodka – half collapsed against her mattress and patted up her body with heavy hands until he’d made out the shape of her in the dark.

Morty wouldn’t have been terribly surprised if he forced himself on her then, drunk and stupid and mumbling, “Morty, _Moooorty_ ,” over and over again like it was the only word he remembered. Honestly, Morty wasn’t sure she’d even hold it against him at that point, she was too tired and too lonely and too sad. But once his hands reached her torso, he pushed at her until she rolled over, crawling under the covers still dressed in everything but his lab coat – shoes included – and spooned up along her back in her too-small-for-two-people, too-short-for-Rick twin bed.

The knot in her stomach loosened and she might have squeezed out just a couple of tears when he pressed his face against the nape of her neck and exhaled one long, deep sigh that almost made her dizzy with liquor fumes even from the other side of her head.

“I fuckin’ spoil you, Morty,” he murmured against her hair, his arms tugging her tighter against him while his knees bent, slotting up behind hers like any space between them would be taken as a personal offense.

And Morty, eyes wide open in the dark and smiling for no one to see thought ‘ _holy shit, this might_ actually _work_.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Morty finally gets a chance to push back.


	19. Chapter Nineteen

The following days were War.

Because what had started off for Rick as a sort of indulgent humor on that morning they woke up in her bed - when he playfully quirked an eyebrow and stretched out like a cat looking entirely too enticing even while he was visibly hungover and she was still less than thrilled with him - quickly morphed into frustrated pettiness when she’d pointed at the collar and scowled.

“Come on, don’t be like that, bud,” he’d whispered directly into the shell of her ear, his voice that raspy, syrup-drenched mockery of kindness, the sound of it making her shiver in the grey light of dawn. He rolled on top of her, pressing her into the mattress and branding her hip with the stiff length of his morning wood.

Morty breathed out a trembling sigh. She _loved_ morning sex – it was so quiet and intimate, all hushed whispering and slow rocking and holding each other close under covers still warm with sleep. It felt _secretive_ but not in the crippling, weighted way she was so used to when she thought of their relationship. Instead it was gentle and private and forced her to picture an imaginary future that hurt too fucking much; of a bedroom that didn’t need to be soundproofed and a bathroom with two toothbrushes and a kitchen where her and Rick could kiss over breakfast.

But Rick was fighting dirty, just like he _always_ did, and that future - that place where they were something closer to a _normal_ couple - was just a fantasy. She probably wouldn’t live to see eighteen she reminded herself viciously for the millionth time. And even if she did, there was a sizable chance Rick would be bored of her by then – why _wouldn’t_ he be, what the fuck did she have to offer? – and if she rolled over and let him win, she’d be doing that over and over again until he’d squeezed her dry.

So she mustered up the most dead-pan expression she could manage while she silently grappled with the instinctive urge to spread her legs around his hips, laying completely still and limp under him and channeling ‘ _I’m not interested_ ’ with every speck of body language she could control.

That teasing smile slipped from his face and he leaned up on his forearms to get a better look at her face, the x-ray sweep of his eyes as he read her thoughts an almost tangible thing. “You can’t be fucking serious, Morty,” he insisted quietly and the surprise and _confusion_ darkening the blue of his eyes inflated something in Morty’s chest that hadn’t stirred in a long time, bolstering her resolve. She tilted her chin up and tapped her finger against the collar, watching in close up fascination as Rick’s brow furrowed into an exaggerated scowl and his eyes narrowed to hard slits.

His mouth thinned in a cruel sneer and he leaned down, yanking the collar of her pajamas to the side and sinking his teeth into her skin hard enough to inspire a muffled yelp. Morty seized with the shock, going stiff under two radically different sensations of pain. When the collar’s jolt released her, she was panting and probably bruised but Rick was glaring down at her like she was a project that unexpectedly blew up – curiosity and anger fighting for dominance as his razor steel gaze bounced between her two watery eyes.

“Then I guess you’re going to school again, _Mooorty_ ,” he huffed, his weight pinning her to the mattress while he sneered down into her face. “Unless you can think of a reason for me to keep you home…”

Morty sighed and rolled her eyes and pushed at his shoulders until he scooted over enough so she could shimmy out from under him, shooting him what she hoped was a disdainful glance before she started getting dressed for what would no doubt be another hellish day.

And he watched, scrubbing at his face with his hand and glaring at her with narrowed eyes like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

The last thing Morty wanted to do ever again was go to school. It had been bad enough the day before and she had _no_ desire to live through the rerun but she talked herself into pulling on her jeans by promising herself she’d never set foot in the building again once Rick gave up.

Rick made her go to summer school that day _and_ the day after that. But a little public humiliation wasn’t enough to tempt her to break – it was unfortunately a very familiar facet of her life and besides that, opportunities to prove Rick wrong were so few and far between that she had to cling to them with every ounce of stubbornness in her body.

Rick portaled her straight to the math room door both days, rubbing her head and messing up her hair before shoving her through and letting the portal wink out behind her back. The second day, she waited for the portal to spiral closed before she turned around and walked right back out of the math room but she hadn’t even turned the corner out of the hall before another swirl of green blocked her path and Rick bodily turned her back to her classroom, glowering at her and whispering, “You don’t want me to tie you to your desk, do you Morty?” like he was only waiting for the slightest provocation to follow through on his threat. Morty wasn’t stupid enough to test his sincerity.

And sitting in class wasn’t the worst part of going to school, anyways. Not that it was _fun_ ; she didn’t follow the complicated equations on the board (she was too far behind and it all looked like gibberish to her), but at least the whispering and taunting died down after the initial shock of the first day, especially since Mr. Goldenfold made a habit of shouting down anyone he caught talking during his lesson.

If anything, once people had adjusted to the sight of buffed steel and blinking lights around her neck, the collar made her even more invisible than before. Without the ability to answer questions, Mr. Goldenfold hardly acknowledged her – something that might have been worth celebrating if it weren’t that _everyone_ seemed more content to let their eyes slide right over her – even more than they usually would. When the class split into groups to work on an assignment, Morty was left alone, the only one-person group, because what good was a partner who didn’t understand the work and couldn’t speak a word?

But Morty could live with that. She was no stranger to the grimaces people wore when they were forcibly paired up with her. Sitting in the back of the classroom alone and feeling stupid, she reminded herself that _Rick_ didn’t hate pairing up with her and he was the smartest man in the universe. Her classmates and their opinions _didn’t matter_.

What mattered was Rick.

What mattered was _beating_ Rick.

No, the worst part of going to school was what waited for her _after_ class. Morty wished her newfound invisibility extended to include Brad and his cronies but they made a point to loiter outside her classroom explicitly to see if she still had the collar and lob crass comments in her direction. Their too-excited faces broke out in wide, malicious grins when they spotted her through the throng of students, their eyes glued to the band at her throat, shouting lewd and progressively less clever jokes at her as she rushed through the hall.

Brad’s words inevitably attracted the attention and laughter of the surrounding students and that promise to never go back to school cemented itself in her heart. Once all this collar bullshit blew over, Rick would be back on her side – jeez, he’d probably be _thrilled_ she’d given up her hold on the one element of her life he didn’t entirely control – and would gleefully send robot-Morty off to school every day if it meant she’d be free for any and all adventures.

She clung to that thought every time she hurried through the halls to the sounds of distant laughter.

Thankfully Jessica’s debate team only met once a week so the overwhelming fear that Morty would run into her in the hall was unfounded. Because after that kiss she had no idea _how_ she was going to face Jessica or how she could explain why she hadn’t texted her or at what point Morty would have no choice but to acknowledge that her lifelong crush on Jessica had withered away at the touch of their lips.

That wasn’t _entirely_ true – it wasn’t like she could erase the programming that made her heart race and her palms sweat when she caught sight of a red swirl of hair on her walk home from school. Jessica was still beautiful and perfect and _kind_. But the feelings that used to feel overwhelming and important faded to a clinical sort of admiration. Jessica was too good for her, which was something Morty had always known in the darkest recesses of her heart. But it still stung all anew to face that head on.

Because Morty was _wrong_ somehow – she had been long before Rick ever showed up but meeting him made her feel a little less damaged because he was fucked up too. Maybe that was why kissing Rick felt like burning in the most exquisite fire, their broken glass edges slotting together, not _perfectly_ but close enough.

Whatever the case, Morty was glad Jessica didn’t have an opportunity to hear the things Brad had come up with – particularly the _true_ half; the comments about being tied up and dragged around on Rick’s leash or worst of all, the endless chanting of ‘grandpa’s girl’ – because otherwise Morty might have to die of shame.

Though more than once Morty _had_ considered texting Jessica, just to reclaim some long-lost semblance of normalcy. Nothing too complex, just a ‘ _Hey_ ’ or a ‘ _What’s up?_ ’ or a ‘ _Sorry about the kiss but can be still be friends_?’ Ultimately, the thought alone had Morty’s palms break out in sweat and Rick - who only grew angrier with every failed attempt to seduce her into giving up - would probably lose his mind if he found out she’d texted Jessica.

On the third morning he shut off his watch alarm with a sleepy grumble and turned over, pinning her with a bony leg flung over her hips and a half-hearted, still-slightly-drunk glare, and she figured she was finally off the hook. She had known from the start he was doomed to eventually cave. He was losing his mind spending all afternoon bored and alone, waiting for her to come home, especially when she made sure to look carefully neutral and unaffected when he appeared through a portal to pick her up at the end of classes.

Her victory, small as it was, bolstered her resolve.

Feeling inflated with relief, she waited until Rick’s breathing turned heavy and deep to slowly untangle herself from Rick’s stupidly long limbs and slip out of his room. She poured herself a bowl of cereal and carried it to the couch, surprised to find mom at the dining room table with her tablet and notebooks until she remembered mom had taken a few days off work to study for her entrance exam.

Morty retreated back to the kitchen, angry at herself for forgetting it wasn’t _always_ just her and Rick. She hadn’t been particularly quiet when she’d left his room but considering the way mom didn’t even glance up from her tablet, Morty figured she was in the clear. She made a mental note to be more careful in the future.

Then again, odds were good mom wouldn’t notice Morty if she stood up on the coffee table and started to tap dance.

Because school wasn’t the only place Morty was invisible. Ever since the collar and Morty’s forced silence, mom was more than thrilled to have a rock solid reason to completely ignore her youngest daughter – unless Morty was doing something that pissed her off, the list of those things including chewing too loud, spending too much time with Rick, and ‘looking too sad’ – whatever the fuck that meant.

Since Morty had no way to communicate except to write out her thoughts – and mom had _immediately_ scoffed at Morty’s handwriting announcing ‘ _I can’t read that_ ’, and ignored the ‘ _What do you want me to make for dinner_ ’ Morty had flashed her as a peace offering - or to act her questions out with charades, Morty was hardly acknowledged at all.

Morty suspected there was something personal there – something deep seated that she’d triggered, that she must have _earned_ by being… well… _Morty_ … But without a way to ask about it, she had no idea what she’d done wrong.

So Mom took to moving around the house like Morty was a piece of furniture - one that didn’t match the living room set but had been given as a gift and was kept around for appearances sake. Morty told herself everything was being exacerbated by mom’s stress from studying but it was obvious that only played a small part. If anything, the studying made mom _happy_ \- gave her purpose and a sense of importance – but Morty kept up with the lie to keep from being crushed under the weight of her mother’s poorly disguised hatred.

The school mom was aiming for was nestled far away in the Andromeda galaxy. It was tough to get into since they only accepted the best students; it was affiliated with one the biggest hospitals in the universe – the very one Morty had woken up in after she was shot in the gut – and mom had developed a new devotion to refusing to settle for second best (something Morty _knew_ had to do with dad and maybe even herself but she tried her best not to think about it too much). Mom spent all her time outside of work glued to her tablet and her books and her notes and Morty tried not to take the frosty silence to heart, but that was a little harder when she started noticing the way mom’s eyes _never_ met hers anymore, instead drifting over her face like it was empty air.

Before the bunker, Morty survived her mom’s ice age by finding refuge in Summer. Together they’d drive across town to get coffee or chat late into the night while listening to Rick pound away in the garage or sit in companionable silence and watch TV, trading eye rolls and pointed looks while mom got progressively more and more drunk.

But now Summer _barely_ lived at home. Morty had no idea where she spent most of her time and it wasn’t like she could _ask_ and even if she could, she doubted Summer would answer. It took Summer no time at all to adapt to Morty’s silence; her greetings or offhand comments pointedly didn’t require a response – not after the first time she’d asked Morty how her day had been and Morty awkwardly scrabbled for a pen and paper, later getting reamed out by mom for scribbling a quick message on the margin of a page of notes Morty had found in the trash. Some of the newly-developed concern that had laced Summer’s eyes when they fell on her little sister had faded back to the apathy and annoyance she’d most often worn before ( _before_ before) and Morty felt the shift like a slap across the face.

Maybe it was because Morty could no longer laugh or hum or gasp in the right places while Summer told a story, or maybe because Summer had obviously made some friends off-planet and no longer needed to vent to Morty who had previously been the only other person besides her and Rick who’d seen more than one galaxy. Or _maybe_ she too saw whatever made Morty so unlikable to mom – maybe Morty was just _unlikable_.

Whatever the case, the lazy afternoons Morty had prized from the time before the bunker – the ones where Summer and her would giggle and spread out across her bedspread and talk about what boys Summer wanted to kiss – those were all a thing of the past.

It was only around Rick that Morty was allowed the use of her voice – only once mom hurried off to work and Summer hadn’t been seen in days that Rick tapped at his watch and Morty could clear her throat to her hearts content and curse out Rick in as many different word combinations she could come up with until she got bored of Rick’s laughter or he shut her up by coving her mouth with his.

But on that front at least, she was finally - for the first time in the history of their relationship - _winning_.

Morty hadn’t overestimated herself when she’d resolved not to give into Rick while the collar still wrapped around her neck. Whether it was thanks to the extended forced abstinence of the bunker or her own determination, she hadn’t flagged despite his constant attacks.

After he gave up on forcing her to go to school, he tracked her through the house like an animal on the hunt. He cornered her in the bathroom to kiss her like a man possessed. He wrestled her for the remote as an excuse to pin her down on the couch and roll his hips against hers. He even tried tying her up, splaying her out spread eagle across his bed and teasing her – something that _always_ left her begging – but though she writhed and panted and melted with lust, she never gave in and he collapsed against her, glaring and palming himself absently.

Rick, on the other hand, grew dangerously frustrated as six days leaked into seven. Where at first he strutted around the house shooting her lewd and confident glances, now he paced like he was trapped in a cage. He shouted at his inventions when they didn’t work perfectly on the first attempt, he stormed out of any room Morty entered only to turn around and stomp back in to prove a point, and his eyes tracked her movements like she was a venomous snake set loose in the house.

But despite all the obvious drawbacks - the awkward silence when the gas station clerk asked if she’d found everything she needed, the strange little scoff mom had perfected when Morty tugged on Rick’s sleeve and pointed at the salt, the wave Summer hadn’t bothered to return the last time she’d taken off in her spaceship - Morty was actually, maybe just _a little bit_ , having _fun_.

It was _strange_ to be the one in control – such a massive reverse from their usual roles – that Morty spent most of her free time dreaming up ways to drive Rick wild.

That was why one afternoon she sprawled herself across the armchair with a cherry popsicle, slowly licking at it while staring down Rick with half-lidded eyes. Mom was next to him on the couch, head buried in her studies like usual, and completely oblivious to the way Rick angrily and openly adjusted himself in his pants while he glared at Morty like he wanted to wear her skin.

But Morty continued her slow tease, rubbing the cool tip of the popsicle along her lips until they were stained red, licking up the sugary syrup that dripped down her fingers, spreading her legs _just enough_ that she caught his eyes flicker down to peek at her panties under her tented skirt.

She hadn’t even gotten far enough to uncover the stick by the time Rick rolled to his feet, grabbed her around the upper arm and hauled her through a portal to the garage. “You fucking _tease_ ,” he spat at her, throwing himself into his chair. The garage door out to the street was open but he turned his back to the bright summer sunlight and made quick work of unbuckling and unzipping his pants, completely disregarding Mr. Yulen mowing his lawn across the street, probably confident the stack of inventions on his desk (and everyone else’s willful ignorance) offered him enough cover.

And Morty, who _did_ miss the sight of Rick’s thick cock throbbing between his legs, was held fascinated. “You think you can break me, huh Morty? You think your _mouth_ is so much better than my hand. Your – _ugh_ – your sweet, red mouth…” He fisted himself furiously, so much more rough with himself than Morty ever dared hold him and she took note of the way he twisted his palm over the head on every upstroke.

Morty watched him masturbate with as much apathy as she could fake which probably wasn’t nearly as much as she hoped. Despite all the things they’d done together, all the different positions, the different locations, the fact that he’d put his mouth on literally every square inch of her body at one point or another, she had never seen him take _himself_ in hand. If felt salacious - like she’d walked in on a private moment she wasn’t meant to observe – and the hair on the back of her arms raised to stand on end.

His cheeks were flushed – half with anger considering the deep V of his eyebrows, half with exertion and arousal if his heavy lidded, lust fogged eyes meant anything – and Morty felt _powerful_.

She was just a gawky teenager, leaned against Rick’s worktable like she did most free afternoons, tilting a slight nod to the neighbor passing their driveway while she licked at a popsicle, watching Rick chafe himself to completion with a dry fist while he completely ignored the world outside the garage, his whole attention focused on her like she was the center of the fucking universe. It was _incredible._

With the collar still activated from the lengthy afternoon in mom’s company, there wasn’t a need for her to say anything – no pressure to dirty talk or rile him up while she was trying her hardest not to feel gutted by the manic, pleading gleam in Rick’s electric eyes. She shifted her weight, trying not to make it obvious she had just clenched her thighs, her legs feeling oddly bloodless as heat pooled at her center.

When she licked her lips, Rick groaned, the sound hoarse and ragged. “Morty – _fuck_ – you want this, don’t you?” He circled the base of his leaking cock and leaned back, putting his long legs and swollen, throbbing dick on display. “I know you love riding Grandpa’s lap, buddy, don’t you want to give the neighbors a show?”

A traitorous slick of interest licked up her spine but she tamped it down by slurping at her popsicle, sliding the whole length of it slowly into her mouth until all that protruded from her lips was the stick, the intrusion cool and sweet against the back of her throat. “ _Fuck_ ,” Rick cursed again, the rhythmic meaty sound of his fist around his skin gaining speed while his freehand dragged through his hair, mussing the already untidy locks.

Rick’s eyes were at half-mast when she dragged the treat back out between her lips and it should have been disgusting or maybe even funny to watch Rick abuse himself but as with so many Rick-things, she couldn’t tear her eyes away, she didn’t want to miss a _moment_.

After all, usually by this point of his arousal she would be too distracted by her own imminent pleasure to take in the finer points of his expression, the way his brow tightened in a way so familiar to his scowl but somehow worlds apart. His whole body rolled with pleasure, his hips curving up to meet his hand.

And jeez – that was all because of _her. Morty_. She wasn’t smart and she wasn’t pretty and nobody loved her but she could set _Rick Sanchez_ on fire from the inside out. What a power trip.

His eyes looked pained and desperate when he held out a hand to her, and she got the first glimpse of something almost like victory. Would this be the moment? Was now when he’d finally break? She elongated her neck to draw attention to her collar and licked at the popsicle with false bravado, quirking her brow. ‘ _You know what you have to do_ ,’ she tried to express with just her eyebrows and from the way Rick snarled she knew he understood.

“I can tell you want it, _Mooorty_ ,” he snapped, his arm stretching out like he was thinking about grabbing her hips and dragging her closer, but she snatched his wrist up with a quick grab and spat a thick red glob of spit into his palm, shoving his hand back at him with the closest thing to a sneer she could twist her face into when she was trying to keep her thighs from trembling.

She knew it was a risk to _spit_ on him - knew he was just as likely to growl and kick out of his chair and shove her against his worktable - but Rick’s gape was an odd mix of shock and something small and feral when he tilted his head down to stare aghast at his hand.

‘ _That’s all you get of me_ ,’ she was trying to express with a hard flat glare and Rick’s growl turned nearly animalistic, his face twisting. At first Morty thought it was rage that caused his teeth to clench and his pupils to blow out - that she’d pushed him too far and now he was going to do something _truly_ terrible - but when he turned his face back up to her, he was panting, his features slack in a sort of muted reverence, and Morty’s stomach dropped down to her feet.

“ _Oh fuck, you’re – you’re_ perfect, _Morty_ ,” he stuttered and Morty’s legs nearly gave out when he smeared her sticky sweet spit over his pulsing cock and started pumping. “Shit, Morty, what you fucking do to me – _jeezus fuck_ –” he was barely comprehensible, black-hole eyes trained on her with a ferocity he reserved for his worst enemies. “Morty, _look at me_ \- look at what you _do to me_.”

With all the self-containment Morty could scrape together, she shifted her weight and leaned back against the counter, trying her best to channel someone who wasn’t dripping wet and aching between their legs, mustering a thin veil of feigned disgust to harden her eyes. The popsicle helped, gave her something to cling to, even if she couldn’t taste the sugary cherry syrup when she dragged the last bite off the stick and let it melt against her tongue. But Rick only groaned louder at her seeming antipathy and the sound went straight to her pulsing clit.

“God – that’s right baby, _I’m a_ monster, _I’m fucking scum_ ,” he babbled and Morty had _no_ idea where the tidal wave of arousal spiraled from or why Rick debasing himself was maybe the sexiest thing she had ever seen but that was just one more obsidian pool of horror amongst the endless bog that kept expanding inside her. “I’m _sick_ Morty, look at me. _Shit_ –”

Morty always loved watching Rick careen over the edge of his orgasm but from this distance it was even more remarkable. She wasn’t watching the spectacle in bits and pieces – she didn’t have to choose between starring up into his awed expression or watching his fists clench the sheets until his knuckles turned white or feeling his thighs quake under her fingers in little after shakes.

She saw it all at once in one beautiful picture.

His whole body clenched, his back arching in his chair, legs tightening as his head turned fitfully back and forth like he was trying to toss off a nightmare. His face scrunched in on itself, eyebrows tenting like he was watching something divine on the backs of his closed eyelids.

When he collapsed practically boneless and swiveled his head to her like he’d lost the ability to hold up his neck, the fire that burned there hadn’t been _diminished_ by his orgasm - he didn’t look sated and content the way he did when they caught their breath panting in each other’s faces; if anything it seemed cumming had doused his heat with gasoline.

Morty was fairly sure her face had lost some of the derision she’d worked so hard to put there, but she _desperately_ hoped it wasn’t openly broadcasting the astonishment she still hadn’t gotten a handle on. Rick’s slow smile and rueful chuckle told her she might need to try a little harder to school her features but she couldn’t stop staring at Rick’s fist and the slick remains of semen painting his fingers.

He released his softening member and pulled out a rag from his pocket to clean his hand, tapping at his watch and looking too smug and too sure and _too goddamn pleased with himself_. The tinny beep sounded next to her ear and instinctively she cleared her throat.

“Got anything to ask me, _Moooorty_?” he taunted, leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees. He was so sure he had her, so sure he’d put on an enticing enough show (and jeezus, hadn’t he) but it was easy – no, not just easy, _deeply gratifying_ – to run her tongue over her bottom lip and tilt her head in the best imitation of indifference she could cobble together when she could feel her heartbeat pulsing between her legs.

“Just –” she had to cough to loosen up her voice, “- just think how much better than would have been if it were my mouth.” She nibbled at the end of her popsicle stick to prove her point.

Rick’s face dropped so completely it was hard to keep from smiling – maybe the hardest thing Morty had ever done – but she was sure he caught the slight tightening at the corners of her mouth because he slammed his fist down on his worktable making the smattering of small metal parts jump and scatter.

She quirked an eyebrow at him (a look she learned from him) and smiled at his furious glare, even when he tapped at his watch and silenced her again, even when he shoved her back into the living room with his hand a little too tight around her bicep, even when he started pounding back gulps from a whiskey bottle he found under the coffee table while his hot, angry eyes pinned her to her seat and she pretended to watch TV, pressing the wooden popsicle stick to her lips.

For the first time ever, it was _easy_ to keep calm in the face of his rage, because for the first time ever, _she was in control._

  

* * *

 

 

As the second week of Morty’s punishment set in, confidence that she only had to wait him out – and not too much longer at that - took root, as _impossible_ as that seemed. She was still sick of the collar and the enforced silence – she tugged uselessly at the weight around her neck, unsticking her hot skin from the metal – but she could feel Rick’s resolve wavering and his suffering was worryingly delicious.

Was that why he tortured her so often? Was watching her squirm as satisfying to him as this was to her? Or was his suffering so appealing because it felt like hard-earned revenge?

For the sake of what little was left of her human decency, she _really_ hoped that newfound sadism didn’t leave a stain on her psyche but that spark of amusement that warmed her heart when Rick stomped through the house glaring like a man gone mad made her think she wasn’t as good of a person as she wanted to be.

Because Rick was absolutely _manic_ and watching him pace around aggravated felt like the best kind of validation – it felt like _payback_ \- his jerky movements restless and overflowing with destructive energy, so much so even _mom_ noticed.

“Not this again,” she actually complained, snapping when Rick kicked away from his place at the dinner table only to pound to the garage and back, pulling a screwdriver and a small snarl of wires from his pocket. “What’s got you all anxious and paranoid or – or whatever this is?” She gestured at Rick with her pen and Morty stiffened. It was _rare_ mom had the nerve to confront Rick but her entrance test was the next morning and the wine glass perpetually at her elbow was still empty, an untouched bottle standing next to it like a threat. Morty couldn’t tell whether she wanted to pull out a bowl of popcorn or run for the fucking hills.

“ _I don’t know what you’re talking about, sweetie_ ,” Rick grit out between his teeth, lifting his head to turn dangerous eyes on his daughter. Morty quickly ran through her options for distractions without the use of her voice. She could stab her fork through her hand or turn over the table or fake a seizure or something, but she wasn’t sure either mom or Rick would notice at that point; not with the blazing sparks they were glaring at each other or with how determinedly her mother ignored Morty’s presence entirely these days.

“You’re all _moody_ ,” mom sighed, like it disappointed her that Rick could display any emotion that wasn’t nihilistic indifference. “It’s distracting.”

Morty pushed back her chair thinking she should clear the blast zone but Rick’s hand landed on her neck and jerked her back into her seat.

“I’m not ‘ _moody_ ’,” Rick growled, his fingers tightening on Morty’s shoulders. “And I’m not ‘ _anxious and paranoid_ ’ either,” he bit out, his voice rising and Morty vaguely felt bad for her mom inadvertently becoming an unknowing victim of Rick’s sexual frustration – and the day before her big important test, too – but that spark of victory just wouldn’t be drowned and Morty had to cover her mouth with her hand to hide her smile.

Because he _was_ moody and anxious and paranoid and it was all because she had him twisting around her finger. She’d woken up that morning to him rubbing himself against her hip in his sleep, his hand stuffed up under her shirt to cup a breast, his face twisted in a snarl. She pinched him awake and while he was half-asleep and nearly delirious with lust, he’d _almost_ broken down, she’d seen it in his eyes when they lingered on the collar.

Then he’d shoved her off the bed and stormed out and she hadn’t seen much of him until he grabbed her by the arm and dragged her down to dinner.

If Summer where around, she’d have rolled her eyes and left the table and thrown out some smart comment that would make the only two adults left in the house realize they were both cranky and taking their stress out on each other. Except Summer _wasn’t_ around. There was only Morty - locked in her seat by Rick’s heavy hand and forced to keep her silence thanks to the band of metal around her neck.

“What are you talking about, Dad? You can’t stop tinkering, you prowl the house at all hours. Look, you’re _fidgeting_.” Mom raised her eyebrows and pointedly stared at Rick’s pallid hand twirling a small screwdriver distractedly over his own uneaten meal. It immediately stilled but a moment after that, the dishes started shaking as Rick’s knee bounced against the table leg. Mom’s deadpan look hardened as she glanced at Rick’s wobbling plate. “You didn’t use to fidget, dad. Can’t you find some _less distracting_ outlet for all this pent up energy?”

“I’d _love_ to, Beth,” Rick grit out, the hand on the back of Morty’s neck winding in her hair and giving a pointed tug. “ _But it’s not that simple_.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be a genius?” Mom was more absorbed in her notebook, her hand flying across the page as she worked on some complicated math problem using half a dozen symbols Morty couldn’t even recognize. It had to be because she was distracted, otherwise she would never have dared – if she saw the look on Rick’s face, his features flat with fury – she would have kept her thoughts to herself. But she didn’t look up when she snapped, “Figure it out,” in a bitter, commanding tone.

Rick’s hand released his death grip on Morty’s hair and shoved her out of her seat so suddenly she nearly landed on the floor

“Morty. Upstairs,” Rick snapped and Morty wanted desperately for him to meet her eyes, so she could entreat him a look to _be nice_ , but he was too busy glaring at mom. At the sharp bite to his voice, mom’s head swiveled up and Morty _saw_ the moment she realized she’d overstepped on Rick’s patience. Her eyes darted to Morty – just for half a second to hover near her hairline – before they swiveled back to Rick in a panic.

It was mom’s look of brittle fear that prompted Morty to leave the room, unconsciously cringing away and darting up the stairs two at a time. She didn’t want anyone to fight (wasn’t that supposed to be a part of how things were ‘ _so much better_ ’ now?) but she had sensed the tension building up between Rick and mom steadily over the last week. Unfortunately, it was impossible to ignore the fact that Morty had probably played a part in drawing that wire tighter, winding Rick up into a seething mass of irritation, but there was something going on there that was deeper than that – something Morty couldn’t even guess at – and it was equal parts curiosity and guilt that convinced her she should stay and listen in.

So instead of rushing to her room and flipping on the sound barrier to drown out the inevitable shouting, she stomped over to her bedroom door, opened and closed it louder than strictly necessary, and crept back to the top step, straining her ears.

Silverware clattered against porcelain and there was an extended moment of silence before Rick breathed out a long sigh.

“ _Jeezus Beth_ , I didn’t realize my _work_ was distracting you.” And _oh jeez_ , he was using the sarcastic, you’re-an-idiot-and-beneath-me tone that never went over well with anyone, let alone _mom_ who so desperately wanted to be on his level.

It didn’t surprise Morty at all that her mother’s immediate response was to lash out. “I didn’t realize you considered bullshitting around with wires and a screwdriver ‘ _work_ ’.”

Morty cringed. Sure enough, Rick’s voice was frozen poison when he grit from between his teeth, “And what - _what the fuck_ would you know about that, Beth?”

“Who’s fault is it that I _don’t_ know, dad? Morty isn’t the only one around here who can be useful,” mom snapped and Morty hated that her name had already fit into the conversation. “I’m studying to be a doctor for god’s sake -”

“Listen, _sweetie_ -” and _oh jeez_ Morty didn’t like the derogatory sound of that ‘ _sweetie_ ’ “- I understand that you’re under a lot of pressure, studying for your _big test_ to be a _big impressive doctor_ or whatever –”

“ _You know it’s not just that_ ,” mom spoke loudly over whatever Rick had been winding up to, and Morty heard the distinct slosh of wine being poured into a glass. “There’s my test tomorrow and the real estate agent coming the day after –” _wait what?_ “- and Joyce and Leonard keep calling me and asking about Jerry…”

_Oh no._ A thick knot of dread tied itself in Morty’s throat anytime she spent too much time thinking about grandma and grandpa Smith so she did her best to avoid it, something made a lot easier by the fact that they had hit the part of their retirement where they spent most of their time on cruises. Ever since… _that night_ … she had only spoken to them once on the phone for a few minutes, Rick leaning against the wall next to the receiver with his arms crossed, glaring down at her like the devil himself.

She’s been so wracked with guilt and nerves and terrified by Rick’s glowering that she had hardly heard what they were saying. Eventually Morty realized it was mostly apologies for how they’d raised their ‘ _useless son_ ’ and Morty couldn’t bear to listen to that when _she_ was the one who should have been apologizing to _them_.

She was pretty sure one slipped out of her – Rick had clamped a hand down hard on her shoulder when she let a stuttering ‘ _n – no, it’s me -_ I’m _the one that’s sorry_ ’ be pulled from somewhere lower than her stomach – but grandma and grandpa had brushed it off, their voices teary sounding when Rick pulled the phone out of her hand and told them Morty was too upset to keep speaking. And he hadn’t needed to lie about that – she’d spent the rest of the night crying into her pillow until Rick got drunk enough to whisper soothing, meaningless reassurances into her ear.

“ _Beth_ ,” Rick sighed, his voice less frigid but still tense. “You just worry about your test. I’ll take care of everything else.” Against her better judgment, Morty scooted down the stairs until Rick came into sight through the staircase railing. He looked casual, draped over his chair like he _hadn’t_ been just about to tear into mom – like he hadn’t kicked Morty out of the room so he could do it in private – and when he tilted the bottle of whiskey up to his lips, they were curved up in a semi-fake reassuring smile.

Not that mom could tell the difference. “Dad, I can’t just –”

“ _Ye-_ eeeeugh- _s,_ you _can_ ,” Rick insisted, the soft thump of a bottle touching the table with a bit too much force echoing up the stairs. He was still mad but was making an effort to keep it under control, a fact made obvious by the deep breath that Morty watched raise his chest. “I’ll handle the real estate agent,” _again, what?!_ “I’ll call Joyce and Leonard, I’ll even drive you to Hyperion for your – _uuuuurp_ \- test.”

From Morty’s place on the stairs, she could only see Rick, his body slightly angled away from her in a side view. There was a long beat of silence punctuated when Rick kneaded a knuckle against his temple and shifted in his chair, the wood creaking below him.

“I’m… doing the right thing, right?” mom asked eventually and Morty’s hands landed over her mouth.

“ _Right_ doesn’t matter, Beth. It _never_ does. You’re doing the _smart_ thing - you’re bettering yourself and getting off this piece of shit rock and leaving all your _Earth_ problems behind.”

Mom considered that quietly for a moment and Morty heard the soft thud of a wine glass being set down. “What will you say to Joyce and Leonard?”

Rick sighed and rolled his eyes, his back stiffening. “I’ll tell them the truth, _re-_ eeeeugh- _latively_ : That we have no idea where their idiot son is and that their constant calls are distracting my daughter from reclaiming her education.”

“ _Dad_ …” Mom admonished.

“Relax, I’ll be nice about it.” He tipped back the bottle to his lips, draining the last of his whiskey. “If they keep it up, we can get you a new number once you’re off planet for good.”

“And the realtor?”

“We’ll list at market value but accept the first bid. It’s not like we’re strapped for cash.”

“And my test?”

“I’ll wake you up with a coffee in hand and you can study on the drive.” Mom didn’t seem reassured judging be the heavy silence at the table.

“And Morty?”

“We’ll be fine. You’ll see, Beth, once you’re out there, you won’t ever look back.”

“It didn’t work out like that for _you_ ,” mom answered and Morty’s eyes practically bugged out of her head. How had mom worked up the nerve to say that?

“Yeah well,” Rick started, his eyes cutting over to Morty like he’d known she’d been there all along. She jolted under the stare, the icy burn of his gaze slicing her all the way to her core. “I didn’t know what I was missing.”

Mom breathed out a ragged, emotional sigh and her thin fingers came into view, wrapping around the hand Rick rested on the table. Rick turned to her, the tractor beam pull of his attention releasing Morty so she could quietly stagger up the stairs and quietly shut herself in her room, too many thoughts in her head.

Mom was selling the house. That made sense in some ways, Morty had peripherally picked up on the idea that mom was planning on moving to whatever planet she wound up studying medicine at. It was a logical decision – even the closest neighboring galaxies were a sizable commute away.

And Morty dimly knew she’d be left completely under Rick’s ‘care’ - as if that was any different from the way things were now.

But Morty had always kind of assumed they’d go about their life like normal. That she’d be expected to keep going to school (or robot-Morty would keep up her attendance at least) and her and Rick would going on adventures (with their suburban house as home base) and mom would make the commute back home for the weekends (if only to keep up appearances).

The way mom and Rick were talking, they weren’t planning on sticking around on earth _at all_.

What did that mean for Morty?

It wasn’t unusual that no one thought to mention something like that to her – no one ever bothered to tell Morty anything important, even less so since she’d been wearing the collar and everyone except Rick had a way-too convenient excuse to pretend she didn’t exist at all. But she kind of felt like she was trying to catch herself mid-fall with no idea where or how she’d land.

Was she going to get shoved into some cheap apartment on earth with Rick where mom could check up on them with exponentially diminishing visits? Or had Rick finally convinced mom that public school wasn’t worth the trouble and they’d move in with her on Hyperion, that frigid silence packed up and shipped over to darken the halls of some bleak utilitarian house like the kind she’s seen from the window of her hospital room.

Or maybe…

A strange bubble of air, equal parts dread and excitement, expanded to fill Morty’s chest.

Maybe Rick was planning on taking off with her – the way Morty always kind of hoped and feared he would one day – just the two of them against the multiverse. Planet hoping, dimension hoping, living life outside the expected confines of ‘go to school, go to college, get a job, work until you die.’

That possible future that always teased Morty – a space of their own with two toothbrushes in the bathroom and no one lurking around the kitchen getting drunk besides Rick – suddenly felt a thousand times more feasible. After all, hadn’t she _just_ decided she was done with school, done with clinging to the lie of being normal, done with pretending she wanted _anything_ to do with the life she’d live trapped on Earth?

It was dangerous to plan too far ahead and downright idiotic to get her hopes up but knowing all that didn’t stop her from wanting it. And _jeez_ did she want it. Even with the fucking collar around her neck she wanted it.

Buoyed by her newfound elation, Morty dug her phone out of her pocket, staring briefly at the picture of her and Rick mid-fuck _still_ set as her background before she swiped to the messaging app, her finger hovering over Jessica’s name before she determinedly clicked it open.

The first three messages were from more than a week ago, from the day after her and Rick had a threesome with robot-Rick. The day he’d put the collar on her. Morty sighed.

_Jessica: Sorry I bailed on you, Morty_. _(10:32 am)_

_Jessica: Got your number from the office. I hope you aren’t in trouble with Rick. (2:46pm)_

_Jessica: Are you okay? (6:58 pm)_

Morty stared at the string of texts and hated herself all anew. Jessica was _so_ nice. So concerned, so conscientious. Nothing at all like Rick.

“ _I didn’t know what I was missing_ ,” echoed in the back of Morty’s head - those electric eyes searing her even in her memory - and she squirmed, curling herself up on her covers and worrying her lip between her teeth.

The most recent message read:

_Jessica: Trisha says you haven’t been to class in a week. I’m starting to worry about you Morty. (3:12 pm)_

Morty had gotten that one earlier in the afternoon and spent almost an hour turning that information over in her brain.

She hadn’t gone to school since Rick stopped forcing her there, figuring robot-Morty would take her place. But apparently her android _hadn’t_ been doing what Rick had heavily implied was her main function. Mom hadn’t reamed her out for all the absences so school must have talked to Rick and he’d probably given some sort of excuse – big fucking surprise – but Morty was still peripherally concerned about her robot doppelganger.

But she could dwell on that later. Right now, she had to figure out what to do about Jessica. She had _figured_ robot-Morty could handle it: robot-Rick proved that robot-Morty got along better with Jessica than she did – apparently they had _real_ conversations– unlike Morty who mostly stammered and made a fool of herself in the beautiful red-heads company. So she had banked on being able to quietly duck out of the situation without ever confronting her own feelings.

Now – with robot-Morty apparently off duty – she had no choice but to take responsibility for her own actions. Jessica deserved better than being ghosted after a stolen kiss.

So Morty sat and she thought and she typed and erased and typed again until she had something she didn’t completely hate.

_Morty: Hey Jessica, sorry for worrying you! I’ve been out with Rick and the reception on Io isn’t great._

_I’m also really sorry for pushing myself on you outside the school – that was extremely not cool. Your first kiss with a girl should have been better than that, more special or something, and I apologize for taking advantage of you._

_The truth is I’ve liked you a long time. You’re smart and kind and you make being a good person look easy._

_But I think we’re on different paths. You have a bright future ahead of you. Please know I’ll always be rooting you on, wherever your life takes you. (7:37 pm)_

Morty’s finger hovered over the send button long enough that the screen dimmed and then darkened, a long groan ripping out of Morty’s throat before she threw herself face first onto her pillow and sighed into stuffing that smelled faintly of Rick’s hair. When she relit the screen, she stared into Rick’s wide, possessive eyes and briefly let herself drown in the dark waters of her inappropriate obsession.

With a furious mental shake she bolstered her resolve, unlocking her phone and pressing her finger to the screen, waiting until the little word ‘ _delivered_ ’ appeared under the text bubble. Then she held down the power button and swiped her phone off.

  

* * *

 

 

Rick stumbled into Morty’s room a few hours later looking older than he usually did, scrubbing his face and squinting at her like he was seeing multiples.

For the first night since she’d sworn off sex with him, Rick didn’t try anything – didn’t try to paw at her or rile her up or tease – he only staggered to the bed and pushed her over to make room for himself, tugging at her and drunkenly grunting at her until she lay her head on his chest where he could card his hands through her hair as he drifted off, her curls a tangled snarl.

But Morty lay awake long after Rick’s breathing evened out into soft snores, staring through the dark ceiling of her bedroom and fiddling with the pendant hanging around her neck, watching the shadows its faint glow cast across her and Rick’s linked fingers where they rested on his stomach.

Rick woke _her_ up the next morning, for a change. She hadn’t even heard his alarm go off so she jerked in a panic when Rick’s hands cradled her head and lips pressed to her forehead. She was much more used to being woken up to rush off on some time-sensitive adventure - the gentleness a strange surprise that made her heart pound for more reasons than one - and she blinked at him thickly in confusion, half wrestling him away.

“Woah there, bud,” he soothed, sitting at the edge of her bed and looking alert and ready for the rest of the day. “I let you sleep in a bit but we’ve gotta get going, Morty.”

It was still pitch black and she didn’t want to turn her phone on just to check the time but dimly she remembered Rick’s plan to take mom to the Andromeda Galaxy so she could take her test. It was federation territory so they had to fly under the radar – which meant no portals and no chance Morty could sit out the nearly five hour flight trapped in the limited confines of the ship with her mother because Rick needed her brainwaves. Luckily Morty hadn’t taken off her clothes from the day before so she shoved her feet into her shoes, stumbled down the stairs and collapsed in the back of the ship, dead to the world before they left the atmosphere.

She woke up again later, her fingers curled around the rough fabric of a blanket – a very familiar blanket, one that smelled like Rick and solder and the metal chill of being underground and she jerked upright, confused and disoriented - even more so when she realized the darkness she was staring through was the blackness of space, not the dimness of the bunker.

“Bad dream, bud?” Rick asked, glancing at her in the reflection of the windshield while Morty tried to calm her racing heart.

“I –” she started, realizing too late she was still wearing the collar when she tensed with the buzz of a shock.

“Don’t hack up one of those bugs in here, Morty,” her mother bit out from the passenger seat, her eyes raking over the notebook she had open in her lap. “We’d be trapped with it for another hour.”

Morty blinked, hating herself for feeling hurt, and caught Rick’s eyes again in the reflection one more time. When she couldn’t make sense of the strange burning seriousness of his gaze, she laid back down, watching planets and stars whiz past on the other side of the glass as they sailed through space, the view igniting a strange feeling of déjà vu that she couldn’t place.

Less than two hours later, the massive silver city-planet Hyperion came into view. Most of the planet was devoted to the hospital, whole huge cities making up specific wards. They flew over massive signs directing them to ‘the cardiac center’ and ‘pediatrics’ and ‘glormablorm’ (whatever the fuck that was) before Rick swerved towards a collections of buildings labeled Hyperion University in big, somber letters.

Just looking at the massive building – with its huge glass windows and winding white pathways and the sea of creatures milling around it in sterile white uniforms – made Morty feel inadequate and she hunched down in her seat, trying to make herself look as small and insignificant as she felt.

“Good luck, sweetie,” Rick saluted mom from the ship where he’d put it down _right_ in front of the doors to the admissions building crushing a neatly manicured row of hedges. They were attracting enough stares to color Morty’s cheeks but mom was absorbed in her notebook, giving a half-hearted wave over her shoulder as she vaulted out of the ship and disappeared through the door. Morty kind of hated herself for the long breath of relief she exhaled as she climbed back into the front seat but she was pretty sure she watched Rick similarly deflate out of the corner of her eyes. “Now that’s over with, let’s have some fun, _Moooorty_ ,” Rick smirked, tilting his head to shoot her a smirk and she grinned back in response.

Apparently Rick’s idea of fun started with breakfast and considering the long trek in the ship and the aborted dinner the night before, Morty wasn’t opposed to the idea. He bought a local paper and flipped through it in the corner booth of a diner where he ordered for Morty and tried not to stare at the place where the line of her sternum disappeared under her shirt. She had borrowed a low-cut, white shirt from Summer’s abandoned bedroom the day before, the neckline even more exaggerated because Morty was neither as tall nor as busty as her sister and if she wasn’t careful, the collar would dip and her tit would make a sudden guest appearance.

And if she _was_ careful, it would happen at _exactly_ the right time - like when she felt Rick’s eyes on her again and she turned casually in her seat to glance out the window where hover cars clouded the sky. She heard Rick’s ragged exhale and calmly tugged the hemline back up and lifted an eyebrow at Rick, aiming for nonplussed.

His legs stretched out to tangle with hers under the table and considering the smoldering, Hindenburg glare he was pining her with, she was pretty sure if she even _seemed_ like she might be asking for it, he’d pounce over the table and fuck her right there in the booth. Slowly, she tilted her chin up and pointed at the collar. Rick scowled, his knee bouncing erratically against the table leg and rattling his coffee cup in its saucer, trying to settle his eyes on the newspaper but they kept drifting back up to her.

And Morty loved it; getting all his attention to herself. She loved the casualness of sitting down to a meal, just the two of them. She loved the way he ordered for her (though maybe not the reason – _fucking_ collar - but it was uncanny how he’d known exactly what she’d wanted off a four page menu) and the way he teased her when she stole something that _looked_ like a fry from his plate ( _definitely_ wasn’t a fry though; it tasted like the color purple on a rainy day), and the way his hand kept finding hers across the table while they waited for the check.

And again the spark of terrified hope lit up in her chest like she was blowing gently on an ember in a field of dry grass. Maybe this _could_ be her life. Rick and her and the infinite cosmos. That didn’t sound bad at all.

But Rick was a wild card – more likely to disappear in a crowd than wake up with her every morning. She carefully stomped out the small flame before it could turn into a forest fire.

After food they wandered around the city. Rick seemed to have specific destinations in mind – he kept consulting the newspaper – but Morty couldn’t ask what they were doing and Rick didn’t offer up any explanations so she tuned out her curiousity and enjoyed the spectacle of a foreign planet.

Though he _did_ try to cop a feel when he draped his arm over her shoulder while they strolled towards the third tall building marked with alien numbers, his hand sliding down the skin of her shoulder and under the neckline of her shirt. She wasn’t even sure he knew he was doing it, especially when he frowned in a genuinely confused way when she slapped his hand away.

Just like he had with the last two stops, he made a quick call on his phone and then an alien with blue skin and gently undulating antennae exited the building and the two started talking in something that almost sounded like Spanish.

While Rick rambled, Morty wandered along the sidewalk, keeping his blue hair and white lab coat in sight. The surrounding street level windows seemed to be shops of some sort and Morty figured they must have left the hospital cityscapes for a more residential neighborhood. One storefront looked like it might be a bakery judging by the trays of pastry-ish things displayed on huge racks, another had a collection of small animals climbing all over carpeted geometric shapes, and one was filled with glittering clouds of smoke that Morty couldn’t make heads or tails of. She wandered back to what she assumed was a pet shop to pass the time while Rick voice drifted down the block.

The creatures were smaller than a cat but bigger than a rabbit and they had four beady black eyes stacked on top of each other in a row. They too had antennae, but they protruded from where eyebrows might have been, their heads crowned with a mane of fluffy feathers. They weren’t exactly _cute_ but they romped around the window display energetically, pouncing on each other and climbing the shelves and Morty was more entertained by them than standing silently next to Rick and listening to him speak in a foreign tongue.

Morty was just making a mental note to ask Rick what the strange animals were called when she spotted the television set pressed up against the back wall near the register out of the corner of her eye and a strange prickle of unease ran down her spine. Her body moved on autopilot, sidestepping to the door of the shop and pushing her way inside. A bell jangled overhead and the lounging employee behind the register jerked to attention at her entrance, turning away from the screen to glance at her.

“Hey,” the blue skinned alien chimed casually and Morty thought ‘ _oh, so they_ can _speak english_ ’ though from the strange resonance of his voice, Morty thought it might have more than one vocal cord. With the collar on, Morty couldn’t give much of an answer, so she struggled with something that _might_ be called a smile and pointed at the screen.

The alien’s eyes darted from Morty’s finger, to the collar around her neck, and then to the screen. “Oh, it’s the intergalactic pet convention,” he said with a shrug, leaning back against the counter and visibly relaxing. “Normally I’d go too but the boss needed me to man the shop.” He rolled his eyes. “The best-pet competition only just started – we haven’t even gotten to the _real_ good stuff, you know the Randian monkeys and the Corsian fire-deaths. You’re just in time.”

Morty had no idea what a Randian monkey was but her and Rick had run from a Corsian fire-death on more than one occasion and they really lived up their names. The idea that anyone would keep one as a _pet_ was a shock to discover.

She gaped at the tentacle covered blob on the screen as it rolled along an astro-turf arena, led on a leash by an alien at least twenty feet tall and vaguely humanoid except for its glistening pearly skin and extra set of muscled arms.

“They’re still on Anaubria Claxon XIV,” the clerk informed Morty, throwing the statement out like Morty would know what that meant and turning up the volume on the constant sonorous hum of an alien broadcaster warbling in that same almost-Spanish she’d heard Rick speak.

Morty squinted at the screen, the glimmering giant circling the arena at a slight jog, the tentacle monster at their side moving at a clip by doing something disturbingly crossed between a slither and a roll, a trail of mucus smearing behind in its wake.

But what had prompted the trail of goosebumps still climbing over Morty’s skin? The giant woman and her ball of tentacles was strange but not so unusual to Morty’s _very_ skewed standards. And sure, it was a _little_ weird watching her four hands disappear between the writhing appendages to heft the creature up onto a table for inspection – especially since the long, squiggling tentacles wound around her arms like ropes, tiny suckers leaving bluish circles on her pearly skin – but something was _wrong_. Some part of Morty’s brain had noticed something off and was screaming at her to figure it out. Generally, that was the sort of intuition Morty could trust, but besides the whole on-another-planet-and-watching-an-alien-pet-competition thing, everything seemed fairly normal.

Until the camera shifted, swiveling away from the tentacle monster and turning the focus to another giant pearlescent creature, one with a _human_ on a leash.

Morty choked out a gasp, and even though her muscles tightened with the shock from the collar, she hardly felt the pain, barely clenched her teeth in a grimace, forcing her eyes to keep open against the instinctual muscle spasm.

Because the human jogging alongside the giant woman at the end of his short tether - naked and obedient and cutting adoring looks up to the alien leading him around the arena - was _dad_.

_Dad_ \- who had been MIA for months, who had been whisked off in the dark of one very confusing night, who had vanished with barely a ripple of unease from mom or Summer or _the fucking world_ \- was being paraded around in an intergalactic pet show like a trained dog.

_What. The. Fuck._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh _jerry_.


	20. Chapter Twenty

Morty must have made some sort of noise – not that she heard it herself, she was too deep in shock both literally and figuratively because the collar set off again and she jerked at the spike of pain and electricity. When the jolt stopped, she was panting heavily, her hands clenched against the register counter to hold herself up.

The store clerk glanced between her hands and the collar, his look a little _too_ knowing, and Morty wished her soul could climb out of her skin and evaporate. “Uhhhhh… is there someone I should call?” he asked, and she couldn’t be sure, but she got the impression he was checking the collar for a tag - maybe hoping for a phone number or an address or the name of an owner. Morty waved his uplifted hand away and shook her head, focusing all her energy on avoiding a full-on panic attack.

She cut her gaze back up to the screen where her naked father was being lifted up onto the judges table, standing up straight and barely even flinching when the alien judge’s clawed paw made contact with his flaccid and very-much uncovered junk.

_Jeezus_ , couldn’t her life be normal for just _one goddamn second_?

“Oh,” the clerk said, following her line of sight. “You a fan of Dum-Dum? I didn’t think a human would be into that.” Morty’s eyes jerked back to the alien behind the counter and she must have looked satisfyingly confused because he grunted and pulled out a cellphone from his back pocket. “He’s, like, _a thing_ right now.”

Then the clerk was turning his phone to show Morty what looked like a social media site, a series of pictures and videos of her dad –of _Jerry_ fucking _Smith_ – doing various inane things: picking at his toenails, curled up asleep and snoring on a massive pillow, struggling to climb onto an oversized chair. There were even a few with big graphic alien letters overtop them like he was a goddamn _meme_.

Her eyes cut back up to the television screen where her father was being manhandled into different positions for the judge’s perusal, his mouth opening automatically when a giant pearly hand offered him a treat, his face twisting up into a smile as he chewed.

Was this what having an aneurism felt like? It must be. Why else was her head pounding and her heart racing and her whole body simultaneously freezing cold but drenched in sweat? The clerk looked vaguely uneasy but kept talking, “Yeah, humans aren’t popular pets –” his eyes darted quickly to the collar around Morty’s neck, “- too smart. Not the smartest _(obviously)_ but generally intelligent enough to protest being subdued.” Another glance to her collar. _Awesome_. “Plus normally you guys talk, right?” he asked leadingly and Morty rolled her eyes, nodding miserably.

“Dum-Dum’s not like other humans though – he’s a little messed up developmentally. Can’t talk, can’t take care of himself, not all there, you know? But Anaubrians are all about that, real _caretakers._ And his owner has made half a fortune off him, filming the weird stuff he does and putting it up on the internet. I hear he’s even got a movie deal…”

The clerk scrolled through his phone for a minute before turning it back to Morty and hitting play on a video of Jerry in a sink so huge it looked more like a small bathtub. He was trying to eat the bubbly foam coating the surface of the water and grimacing at the taste, only to immediately try it once again to the same result.

Morty felt vaguely ill.

So _this_ was what Rick had done with dad.

But dad wasn’t… himself. What happened there?

Had Rick hit him hard enough to give dad brain damaged before casting him out to a far corner of the galaxy? Or did dad wind up… _like that…_ because of something that happened after Rick banished him? Did Rick _sell_ dad to that giant alien lady or did he throw him out into the wild in the hopes he’d die of exposure?

Or – _oh jeez_ – was her dad _pretending_ to be helpless and pathetic and – and fucking _learning disabled_ because it meant he got babied by a massive alien babe? And how _awful_ was it that the more Morty thought about it, the more that seemed like an actual viable option?

The pet store clerk clearly wasn’t reading Morty’s distress because he kept scrolling down the page that was titled ‘ _Dum-Dum_ ’ surrounded by sparkle emojis and all the images were seriously disturbing stuff. Videos of dad picking his nose and eating his boogers, burning himself on a huge stove, and nuzzling into the huge Anaubrian’s muscled thigh until a big hand stroked his hair.

The bell over the door jangled again but Morty was too busy trying not to keel over. The clerk, glancing up at the newcomer, quickly tucked his phone back into his back pocket and plastered on a customer service smile.

“Welcome!” the blue alien greeted the new customer magnanimously and Morty thought pretty seriously about passing out.

“Morty, reme- _eeeugh-_ mber what happened the last time you wandered off?” Rick’s irate, rasping growl jerked her out of her reverie and she swung her head around so quickly her hair whipped into her open mouth. “Looks like we’re in the right place if I want to invest in a leash…” Rick’s pleasant, vaguely bored expression tightened as he honed in on her features – no doubt her face was twisted in shock and slowly smoldering towards anger because a simmering spool of rage was leaking through her veins, bunching up her muscles like she was prepping for a fight.

Rick’s gaze swiveled between her and the clerk, his brow lowering dangerously. “What’s got you so – oh -” he bit off his words when his spark-bright eyes drifted up to the TV, a slow, predatory smile curving his mouth up maliciously. “No _fucking_ way.”

The camera cut to a close up of dad, his face mashed against the cleavage of the giant pearly woman as she lifted him from the judge’s table and set him on his own two feet. For a moment he clung to her, his hands fisted in her nice dress, but she stroked his head and he released her, keeping pace with her as she drifted out of frame.

The pet show announcer was speaking in that rolling almost-Spanish Rick had spoken so fluently earlier and Morty could tell from the fever bright mania just starting to rattle his chest with a laugh that Rick could understand the words - that he was probably getting an abbreviated version of what the store clerk had just told her - and that he found it all _hilarious_.

“ _Rick_ ,” Morty seethed, loud and assertive, her fury enough to carry her through the whole body clench the shock collar submitted her to. And Rick’s smirk dissolved a bit at the tone of her voice, his eyes jumping back down to her, something almost _sheepish_ (but still _way_ too pleased) taking its place.

“Uhhh – can I help you find something,” the clerk blurted and Morty wasn’t surprised he’d try to interrupt, she was practically vibrating with rage, her fists clenched so tight they were shaking, and if Rick didn’t wipe that smile off his stupid smug face, she was going to pick up one of the weirdly shaped goldfish bowls off the display next to the register and crack it over his head.

Rick pulled the flask out of his pocket and seemed to pluck her thoughts right out of her head, his stance widening, his eyes glimmering with challenge. “Nope, not – _uuurp_ \- nothing we need, isn’t that right, _Moooorty_.” He stretched out a hand like he wanted to land it on her shoulder and she slapped him away. His irises burned neon bright against the blacks of his pupils. “Why don’t we take this somewhere else.”

Morty realized that she was panting, taking noisy, heavy breaths that just skirted the line of what the collar allowed, and if she had the power to set people on fire with her mind, Rick would be _ablaze_. She pointed once, fiercely at the collar and Rick’s eyes sparked.

“ _Morty_ ,” he warned but the tone that normally set her nerves on edge was _useless_ against the anger surging through her like water bursting through a dam. He frowned and rolled his eyes but pushed open the door and she had to use all her self-restraint to keep herself from tackling him out into the street.

As it was, she only made it three steps towards the ship before she spun back to him and shoved him as hard as she could.

“RICK!” she shouted, nearly doubling over with the much more intense shock exploding through her body and turning her cartilage to static. It was rare she kept up enough noise to get such an intense shock and she might have keeled over from the drain of it if she weren’t running on pure fury. But the feeling of raising her voice after so long – the rush of endorphins and adrenaline stampeding through her system making her fearless – it was _empowering._

But Rick was hardly paying attention - scrolling through his phone, his eyes glued to the screen in his hand - and she didn’t need to see it to know he had found ‘Dum-Dum’s’ social media page because Rick was beaming like he was just offered free drinks for life.

Then he started laughing - rich and deep and cruel – a hand pressed to his stomach with mirth, and Morty was reminded again that even if she _thought_ she knew him _sometimes_ , he always had a way of surprising her with new lows.

She fumed, taking three more steps in the direction of the ship before she changed her mind and turned around again, balling up her fists and pounding them against his chest _._ He staggered back half a step but she could tell from that gleam of amusement crinkling the corners of his eyes that her show of force wasn’t in any way intimidating to him. And he only grew more unbearably smug when she made a swipe for his phone and he yanked it back, holding it above his head and out of her reach.

“Woah there, buddy,” Rick breathed out on a chuckle, his face lit up with an obnoxious grin.

She elbowed him in the stomach and pointed at her collar with a trembling finger, mouthing ‘ _take this_ fucking _thing off_ ’ so vehemently she accidentally shocked herself again when she let the ‘ _fucking_ ’ slip out.

“Oka- _aaugh-_ y, I can see you’re mad,” he said around a laugh while she panted to regain her breath – something cagey in his eyes when he stretched out a hand towards her arm but she jerked out of his reach, angrily marching towards the ship which he’d put down in an abandoned lot a block over.

“ _MAD_?!” she screeched rhetorically, stumbling to a knee, an involuntary whine ripped out of her throat at the shock that that literally raised the hair on her arms. _Fuck_ that hurt. She could feel the burst of electricity all the way down to her _bones._

“Jeezus you gotta calm down, Morty,” Rick urged, his voice losing some of its humor and before she had regained her senses his hand was wrapped around her bicep and hauling her to her feet.

As soon as Morty’s legs were willing to obey her again, she mustered up the hottest glare she could summon when her teeth were still buzzing in her skull and yanked herself out of his grip, stomping off towards the ship. She felt Rick follow.

“ _Morty_ –” he sighed and when she picked up her speed to a half-jog, she heard Rick’s footfalls quicken to keep pace with her. “There are _infinite_ Jerries – what makes you so damn sure –”

She jerked to a halt and spun around to face him, her eyebrows so high on her forehead she was pretty sure they were going to climb off her head. With only her eyes at her disposal, she _begged_ him to tell her it wasn’t her dad – that somehow some _other_ Jerry got dumped in U-694 and this was all some fucking fluke – because that would _really_ take some of the edge off.

Rick’s eyebrow furrowed into a V and he kneaded the lowest part with his knuckles. And she hated ( _hated_ ) that a part of her felt cripplingly relieved that he wasn’t going to stand there and _lie_ to her because that might have broken her heart in half.

“Did –” she bit out, bracing herself for the pain but she still regretted the single word when she had to catch herself against the pole of a street sign to keep her legs from buckling. Her thinking was getting fuzzy from the shocks, her brain conflicted with all the foreign electricity messing with her impulses, and she shook her head like the motion might clear her mind.

Rick was scowling at her and there was something about the deep frown lines on either side of his mouth and the deeper set shadows under his eyes that she hadn’t seen in a while. Not in anything more than a brief flash when he’d pulled her out of that pink muck and saved her from drowning, a thin memory of the expression he’d worn when she’d woken up on the very planet they stood on now, Rick tinkering with the valves of an IV plugged into her arm and looking haggard and worn down.

“‘ _Did I know_ ’?” he filled in the question for her, everything about his body language screaming that he wanted to close the three foot gap she very purposely left between them. “Is that what you wanted to ask, _Mooorty_?”

She nodded, her heart lodged in her throat.

“N- _ooooough-_ o idea.” He pulled out his flask and took a long drag, his live-wire eyes searing into her.

Okay, that was _something_ at least. Rick hadn’t _kept_ this from her – and considering the fever bright interest with which he glanced down and continued scrolling through ‘Dum-Dum’s social media page, she believed him.

But Rick was too thrilled about it even though it was _so fucking disturbing_. Morty felt sick to her stomach and she couldn’t figure out how much of it was from all the muscle-tensing shocks and how much was good-old-fashioned _horror_.

She spun on her heels and hurried around the corner, determined to get to the ship – irrationally feeling like she’d be safer there when she inevitably completely freaked the fuck out because she could feel a panic attack coming like a seismograph needle just starting to wobble.

“Where’s the problem, Morty?” Rick groused, his footsteps hurrying to chase after her. “He’s _happy_. That’s – _Morty_ , this is the happiest I’ve ever seen him.” His fingers wrapped around her arm and dragged her to a stop, his phone thrust up under her nose showing her all sorts of things she _didn’t_ want to see: her dad wearing a diaper, her dad lazily rutting against a huge throw pillow, her dad cradled in massive toned arms, his cheek nuzzled against a breast as big as his torso. “This is _literally_ the life he always wanted, Morty. He’s doted on and unemployed and _fucking internet famous_! He’d _choose_ this in a heartbeat.”

“ _But_ –” she grit out seizing, “- _did_ –” she gripped the rough stone of a building with both hands to keep from keeling over, “ _he?_ ”

“Holy shit, _stop_ Morty, you’re going to kill yourself,” Rick said, and Morty didn’t miss the way he’d dodged her question.

A hysterical “ _Ha!_ ” burst out of her unbidden and the trail of tears leaking down her cheeks felt like lightening crackling down her face. She crumpled to the ground again, convulsing with the strongest shock she’d ever felt in her life – all her muscles painfully bunched and refusing to relax, garbled silent laughter still pouring out of her mouth.

When the shock released her, it was almost as painful as it was a relief, the sudden unclench reminding her of all the muscles previously unused that had just been squeezed through the wringer. Rick was kneeling over her tapping at his watch and looking worried and she hated him so much in that moment it felt like a physical weight rooting her to the ground.

“ _Jeezus fucking christ,_ Morty,” he bit out, his fingers pressed against her pulse point, right above the collar. The metal must have been holding on to some leftover charge because she heard the static _pop_ of a shock though her body was too numb to register the sensation.

Rick grimaced but didn’t remove his hand.

“ _Take me there_ ,” she panted, relieved he must have turned the collar off, wanting nothing more than to stay right where she was, crumpled against an alien building, for the rest of her life - wishing _desperately_ that she hadn’t wandered off, hadn’t stumbled upon the pet shop, that she still didn’t know what fate she’d forced upon her dad - because how was she supposed to live knowing he’d been reduced to… to someone’s _pet_?

She felt herself convulse with a phantom shock, the weight of the collar an unbearably heavy line around her neck.

“It’s okay, bud,” Rick soothed, his voice weird and a little strained. Morty didn’t like the sound of it and even though her vision was still blurry from the bursts of electricity, some base instinct notified her that Rick was pulling something out of his pocket and it _wasn’t_ his portal gun. “We’ll just do a little _creative erasing_ …”

And then there was a _gun_ pointed at her face – Rick was aiming a double barreled gun at her face – and despite the heaviness of all her limbs, she lashed out hard with a leg, kicking him in the stomach, using the momentum to send her rolling to her hands and knees.

“Rick _what the fuck_ ,” she spat, struggling to make her numb limbs function, scrabbling unsteadily to her legs. Her fingers clutched for the topaz gem at her wrist and pinched it shakily against the heel of her palm. “You’d fucking _kill me_?! _Over this_?!”

Rick’s face bunched into a frown. “It’s a memory gun, Morty. I wouldn’t fucking _–_ ” he scowled and ran a hand through his hair, breathing deeply through his nose. “Give me _some_ fucking credit, at least.” And now that she got a better look at the gun he was carefully pointing down and away from her face, it _did_ look kind of familiar. It called to mind metal walls and cold grating under her bare feet and a crowd of anxious, exotic boy-Morties huddled against a bay door.

And with a sickening lurch, a thought she somehow hadn’t put together shaped itself firmly in her head. “H - how many times, Rick –” she demanded, voice shaky with distrust. “How many _fucking_ – do you do this a lot, Rick? Wipe my memories when I find out something you – you don’t want me to know?”

“ _No_ ,” he bit out through his teeth, looking for all the world like he wanted to sink his teeth into her neck and tear open an artery. “This would be the _first_ , Morty.”

“Bullshit,” she snapped.

“ _Morty_ ,” he insisted, and the word was laced with enough fury to give her pause, “Think about all the fucked up things you know. If I made a habit of _erasing your memories,_ you think I’d leave all that shit behind?”

Morty thought that through as she struggled to catch her breath.

She’d seen him close the hatch door of an escape pod and hit the eject button as a family - including three young children - ran towards them, pleading for them to wait, the intergalactic cruise ship they were fleeing imploding with the family still inside. She’d found him blacked out and covered in his own shit and vomit from a night of such reckless drinking, she had to wonder if he was actually trying to kill himself. She’d watched him beat an alien to death with nothing but his bare hands – literally _tearing_ the creature apart like a rotisserie chicken - just because it had looked at Morty funny and Rick had a few too many drinks.

She scrubbed two shaking hands against her eyes, dragging them down her face with a quavering sigh.

“Yeah, that’s what I fucking thought,” he grumbled, tucking the memory gun back into his pocket and crossing his arms over his chest.

“Then why now?” She crossed her own arms but the gesture felt less like a show of obstinance as it was a desperate attempt to hold herself together as she shook off the ghost of being sizzled alive. She raised her eyes from his sternum to his face and whatever expression she must have been making, she _watched_ Rick’s usual confidence melt away - just for a split second - into something vulnerable and insecure before he shuttered it hard behind a fierce scowl.

He rolled his eyes. “D- _ooough-_ o you want to go see Jerry or not?”

“I – yeah, I guess I do.”

When he grabbed her by the bicep, she concentrated on not flinching away, and the feeling of his fingers was less firm than his usual vice-like grip. “ _Fine_ ,” he grit out, clearly trying to sound indifferent. “But we’ve got to be careful, Morty. That convention is probably crawling with Federation bugs and I don’t really feel like dying just to prove a point.”

After a few shifty looks around at the mostly deserted street, he dragged her into a narrow, clean alleyway between two minimalist buildings.

He spun the dial on the portal gun, paused, grumbled to himself a bit, and then finely tuned the coordinates one more time. Morty’s heart was pounding and on habit she glanced behind them to make sure no one had boxed them into the narrow alley, checking the windows for looky-loos but they were alone, pressed close together by the high white walls on either side of them.

Was this even the right thing to do? Did she _want_ to see dad? And what the hell was she going to do when she did?

She had zero answers and about a thousand questions but she knew that she had to see him in person - had to look at what she’d done to him head on and hold herself responsible for her rash actions – because it was all her fault dad was… _whatever_ the fuck he was now.

And if it was really bad – if dad wasn’t _okay_ \- well, she hadn’t worked out her plan for that yet but she was used to flying blind.

Squeezed up next to each other in the narrow alley, Morty felt Rick’s deep sigh when his chest brushed against her arm and she dragged her eyes back up to his face. Against all odds, he didn’t look angry or frustrated or even annoyed anymore. Instead there was something resigned about the slight tent of his unibrow, something sad in the dull sheen to his eyes. “This is a bad idea, Morty,” he growled low and quiet, the waft of vodka scented words stirring her bangs.

Morty nodded, a moment later remembering that she could use her voice.

“Yeah, I –” she sighed too, “- I know, Rick.”

His eyes jumped between the two of hers for one steadying moment and then he shrugged, pointed his portal gun at the back wall of the alley, and shot a swirl of green.

They stepped out into a hallway of white painted cinder blocks, rows of fluorescent lights lining the dim corridor. Dark open doorways lined the wall in both direction and Morty glanced around, thinking they must have portaled to the wrong coordinates. The bleak hallway didn’t look anything like the elaborate convention show floor she’d seen on TV.

She had to remind herself that the collar was off and she could ask where they were but before she opened her mouth, Rick laid a hand on her shoulder and turned her back to him, his glower unusually somber.

“I’m serious about being careful, Morty,” he urged, and Morty sucked her bottom lip between her teeth. “We haven’t been this deep in Fe- _eeeugh-_ deration territory since we stole those religious texts. Remember how that shook out?”

_She did_. Shooting. Running. A half mangled Gromflomite leaking viscera all over her homecoming dress and pressing a blaster to her chin. A shot so close to her ear she felt the heat of it warming the skin of her cheek.

That was the night Rick held her on his lap the entire drive home and closed up the thin scrapes on her hands and knees. And then later he pushed his fingers inside of her for the first time, the world expanded, and her heart changed its shape to better fit him.

Of _course_ she remembered. Morty jerked her head in a stiff nod.

“Yeah well, they’d be thrilled to run into us,” Rick continued, pining her with his glower. “ _High-security-prison_ level thrilled. Assuming they don’t just shoot us on sight.” Morty swallowed heavily, a tangle of nerves spooling in her stomach. Rick didn’t usually give little ‘ _be careful_ ’ speeches and the gravity of the situation wasn’t lost on her. “So stay close.”

She nodded again and Rick’s fingers eased up from where they’d been digging into her shoulder but he still kept her under his arm as they hurried down the dim hall and into a non-descript elevator, Rick jabbing at the button marked with a star.

When the doors opened back up again, the scene was _unmistakably_ the setting of the intergalactic pet convention. Creatures of every size, shape, and creed milled about in a massive foyer and Morty’s eyes couldn’t decide where to land. There were aliens she recognized and a lot more that she didn’t and some that didn’t look like they should be sentient at all – like the swirling mass of particles that whooshed around her on an impossible breeze, slipping up her loose, borrowed shirt and leaving goosebumps in its path up her spine.

Straight ahead, through doors designed to fit even the hugest of convention-goers, curtained booths lined an extravagent show floor, and the low hum of a thousand voices, growls, and screeches echoed in a space that had to be bigger than three city blocks.

Despite the fact that they were there to find and maybe rescue her dad from… whatever life he led as a glorified pet, Morty couldn’t contain her amazed gasp, and she turned back to Rick beaming in wonder.

But he was a few steps behind her, caught up by a blob creature trying to slurp into the empty elevator, the two of them locked in the ‘you go this way, I’ll go this way’ dance.

As Morty watched, Rick staggered, bumping into the blob, and mumbled, “Oh, ‘scuse me.” The blob creature warbled something in response and shoved past Rick trailing something hairy and round on a leash. Then Rick had his hand back around Morty’s arm, hurrying her toward the huge show floor doors.

When they’d gotten a few steps away, he glanced over his shoulder and brandished a goopy lanyard where a badge dangled covered in various alien script.

“Got our ticket in,” he smirked and Morty smiled back despite herself – she hadn’t even seen his sleight of hand and she’d been looking for it. Rick ran his fingers down the lanyard, squeezing out the gunk the other creature had left behind, _shlick_ ing it to the floor carelessly before he dropped it over his head to dangle around his neck.

“What about me?” she asked, too aware of the aliens in orange security vests flanking the massive doorway they were approaching. With another sweeping glance of the area, Morty realized the huge glass doors leading out to sunshine – the doors they’d luckily avoided by portaling directly underground – had practically been converted into a checkpoint for Federation Gromflomites. Officers in uniform flanked the walkway, stun batons cradled against their elbows and rifles slung over her back.

So Rick hadn’t been kidding about the level of danger. She had half hoped it was some kind of scare tactic to make her back out of trying to find her dad but apparently she’d been off the mark.

The sheer amount of Feds almost made her change her mind about pressing forward, Rick’s unusually serious threat of some mysterious alien high security prison ringing in her ears, but she bolstered her courage and straightened her back, determined to push on.

She saw Rick take in the armed bugs with a hard swipe of his eyes and he rested a hand on the back of her neck, right above the collar, tugging her a little closer to his side. And it was comforting, in a way. Rick was the smartest man in the galaxy. They’d done way more dangerous things under the Federation’s wiggly mandibles than sneak into a convention. If they were careful, they’d be fine. Maybe. _Probably_.

“Just let me do the talking, Morty,” Rick bent down to murmur in her ear and she tried not to let the feel of his lips against her temple distract her. And she was grateful – shamefully grateful – that he didn’t tap at his watch like he might have a couple hours ago, turning it on to keep her silent. It carried a stupid amount of meaning that he _trusted_ her to follow his instructions. And Morty had to wonder if it was as close as she was going to get to an apology.

“Hold it, no one past this point without a badge,” a lobster-looking alien stepped into their path, holding up one large red claw. Despite the creature’s size, it had a high-pitched, whiny sounding voice and Morty tried not to laugh at the unexpected contrast.

Rick made a point of swiveling his head to watch a tiny Traflorkian wobble past, the lanyard around its neck nearly dragging on the ground while a massive muzzled Gazorpazorp followed behind it blithely on a leash.

“He doesn’t have a badge,” Rick pointed and Morty flushed as the crustacean alien gave her a quick glance, it’s antennae eyes lingering on the collar around her neck, extra prominent with her low cut shirt. She self-consciously adjusted the neckline, tugging it up when she felt its gaze drop to the line of her sternum.

“Yeah well, _pets_ aren’t required to have a badge…” it said, one of his antennae eyes swiveling back to Rick, the other still ogling her below the neck.

“Then we’re good here,” Rick interrupted, tucking her a little closer to his side. Morty resisted the urge to cling to his lab coat but only barely.

The alien gestured to Morty with its claw, its strange, boneless face twisted into something skeptical. “ _That’s_ your –”

“- pet? Yu- _uuugh_ -p.”

“You keep a creature from your _own species_ as a pet?” the lobster-looking alien asked, disbelief and something kind of like disgust coloring his tone and Morty tried to keep her face downturned and placid but she was pretty sure her cheeks were cherry-red.

Jeez, _was_ she Rick’s pet? How different would her life be if she was? She already wore his collar and trailed him all over the universe, doing her best to be useful. He took care of her and manhandled her around all over the place and most of her meals in one way or another filtered in through him.

Well _fuck_.

She shook herself out of her epiphany abruptly. She could have existential crisis _later_. Now there wasn’t time.

Rick scoffed at the lobster-alien and tilted his neck until it cracked. “ _Look_ at us. You think we’re the same species?”

The alien blinked and his antennae eyes did a very visible up and down scan of first Rick and then Morty. “What is it, then?” the alien demanded, narrowing its glare on her.

“She’s a human.”

“And what are _you_?”

Rick straightened his shoulders and she heard something start to _whir_ at her side. She stole a glance up at Rick but his right eye had changed – the white had vanished to reveal vibrant red underneath, striated with glowing yellow lines like a targeting system – and Morty’s mouth fell open. _What the fuck_ …

“Something better,” Rick answered, voice dark and final – the kind of voice most people found hard to argue with. The lobster-alien gulped, the bulge of it traveling down his soft neck.

“S – sorry sir,” it answered, cringing away from Rick. “I’ve never even _seen_ a human before today and now we’ve got two in one year.” It cut its eyes over to Morty – she suspected to break the glaring contest Rick was thoroughly winning. “Do they make good pets?”

“No- _ooough_ -t at all. High maintenance as _fuck_.” He shot her a pointed look and she gaped as she watched the red orb iris closed, his familiar ice-blue eye rimmed with the fleck of silver taking its place. _What the_ actual _fuck_ … “Speaking of, you know where I can find the other one?” The alien frowned, or at least the lobster version of frowning which was mostly portrayed by a downward slant of the slash that was its mouth. “I was hoping to talk to his owner, one – _uuurpp_ \- human-enthusiast to another.”

“Good luck with that,” he answered brusquely. “V.I.P.s are set up against the back wall but they tend to keep to themselves.” Rick’s fingers at the base of her neck started shoving her forward.

“Gre- _eeeugh_ -at,” Rick called over his shoulder as they hurried away but the glance she cut over her shoulder proved the lobster-alien watched their retreat until they disappeared into the throng of creatures.

“Shi- _uugh-_ t,” Rick cursed for the both of them, tugging Morty behind a particularly tall alien and/or pet that seemed to be mostly made of hard rock. He stood up on his toes to crane his neck, his usual noticeable height a lot less impressive surrounded by the milling figures, some of which had to be nearly thirty feet tall. “Okay, I’m sick of this place already. Let’s find your dad and get out of here.”

Morty perked up in surprise. “Wha – really?”

He cut her a glare from the corner of his eyes. “I meant _the two of_ _us_ get out of here. He stays.”

“ _Rick_ …”

“We aren’t having this discussion, it’s a waste of our – look, over there,” he interrupted himself, pointing through the crowd to where a vaguely familiar looking giant woman with pearly skin easily maneuvered through the mass of bodies. “There she is, Morty, let’s go.”

With the room as crowded as it was, he dropped his grip on her neck and took hold of her wrist, shoving and weaving his way through the room, dragging Morty in his wake until they watched the big lady approach a curtain marked ‘ _V.I.P’_. There were two more burly looking security guards standing under the sign and they nodded to her as she approached, tugging a blue curtain aside so she could duck through and disappear inside.

Rick tightened his grip on Morty’s arm and shuffled them over to the nearest wall, the moving crowd wandering loosely around them. Other aliens and their pets (‘ _pets_ ’ being used _real_ loosely cause Morty saw three more tentacle monsters and what was unmistakably an earth lion being led around on a leash) had camped out against the wall, and Morty tucked herself against Rick’s side trying to look inconspicuous. In an assembly of creatures as varied as the intergalactic pet convention, that was relatively easy.

Taking careful glances around Rick’s shoulder, Morty eyed the two big lobster-aliens guarding the curtained off area likely housing dad.

“You know this would be a _lot_ easier if we waited a couple days and tracked him down to his home planet, Morty,” Rick said, practically scraping the thought right out of her head.

“His home planet is _earth_ , Rick,” she reminded him petulantly and he rolled his eyes.

“His _new_ home planet then, _whatever_.” Rick shrugged and pulled his flask from his pocket, audibly downing two big swallows. “I can tra- _aaaugh-_ ck his brainwaves Morty, find him in _no time._ Plus, that Anaubrian broad re- _eeugh-_ ally isn’t as careful with her social media page as she probably should be. I already have a pretty good idea which neighborhood to start with.”

Morty spared Rick a lingering glance and chewed on her lip.

The logic there was sound. If they waited until the pet show ended, dad would go back to his normal, semi-famous, _much more private_ life of luxury. Rick could track him down and they could discreetly portal in and out of the cozy house from all those Dum Dum posts without anyone ever realizing they’d been there.

There’d be no Gromflomites or security guards or a million eyes just itching to rat them out to the Feds if they opened up a portal and made a scene. It would be safer and smarter and would give her some time to think about _what the hell_ she was going to say to her dad – if he even had a chance of understanding her – or what she was going to do if he needed to be rescued.

But she _couldn’t_ wait. If Morty went back to her normal life, if she didn’t pursue this _now_ \- if they portaled back to Hyperion and picked up mom and went home - inevitably Morty’s anger and confusion and horror would fade to the seemingly constant background hum like it _always_ did. And if she didn’t have fear and fury to motivate her into action, she wasn’t sure she’d have the nerve to hunt dad down again.

She shook her head firmly and Rick’s glower darkened. “What – what did you do to him, anyways?” she demanded, doing her absolute best to withstand the full brunt of his electric glare. “Why is he –” she gestured blandly with a shrug, completely lacking words to describe the pathetic, needy creature her father had been reduced to. “I - I need to know, Rick.”

Rick considered her silently for what felt like an entire minute but eventually his shoulders loosened and he ran a casual hand through his hair, rolling his eyes up to the ceiling while he grit out, “I erased his memory, Morty.”

Her brain stumbled to catch up. “Oh. But –” Dad wasn’t acting like Summer had after he’d taken that tiny little memory from her head - she had been indistinguishable from normal. _Dad_ was completely messed up… unless… “How – _Rick_ , how _much_ did you –”

“All of it,” he snapped, beating her to the punch, his eyes hard - _daring_ her to admonish him - but all she felt was a wave of exhaustion so intense it nearly swept her off her feet.

Her anxious fingers drifted to the gem hanging from her wrist, twisting it on the chain as she tilted her head back and stared unseeingly through the ceiling. She was here because _she wanted to be_. She’d asked that question because she _wanted_ to know. She knew she wouldn’t like the answer but at least Rick hadn’t lied to her.

With a steadying sigh, she dropped the topaz to scrub a hand over her eyes, breathing out one long, wavering exhale. “ _Why_ …?”

Something in his face crumpled and he looked a lot less cool and aloof than he usually did, the shift snagging her attention like a blinking light. “This is all _your_ fault, Morty, you know that right? You –” he grit his teeth and his gaze slid unseeingly over the room before he restarted. “I had to send him somewhere _safe_ , isn’t that – _Morty_ , isn’t that what you wanted? And I had to make sure he wouldn’t wander around the universe talking shit about me _or about you_ –” he emphasized pointedly, jabbing a finger at her chest “ _-_ to the first fucking Rick he stumbled across, cause that’s a fucking liability just _waiting_ to happen. It woulda been so much easier to just –”

He broke off to groan a long frustrated sound that made a very hairy dog-sized thing with two extra legs jump up and start growling at them. Rick ignored it completely, his focus glued to her. “I couldn’t just dump him in the woods or something cause his sorry ass would _die_ , so I sent him someplace he’d be taken care of. Isn’t that – _don’t you get it_ , _Morty_? _You_ asked for this.”

She didn’t need him to tell her that, she already knew. She thought about it all the fucking time. _She had_ asked him to get rid of dad. And damn the consequences.

Even when she made him promise, locking in that cell on the Palisade, she had seen it in his eyes - that hard glint, that murderous rage, that psychopath lurking just under his skin. Until she was staring up into his face and watching his eyes flicker between something guarded and a terrible stubbornness, she didn’t realize she hadn’t _honestly_ thought he would keep his word, instead clinging to what she _knew_ was a delusion for her own emotional well-being.

But against all odds, he _hadn’t_ killed dad… He’d even tried (in a _very_ Rick way) to look out for dad’s safety… Because _she_ asked…

_Wow_. That was too much for Morty to process all at once.

Rick glared at her as he tilted his flask back and took another three swallowed. “Do- _ooough-_ n’t – don’t give me those kicked puppy eyes, Morty, this is _your_ fucking fault.”

“ _Jeez_ , Rick, _I know_ ,” she breathed, grabbing him by the forearms and bracing him because he seemed angry enough to pull his portal gun out and disappear. Her admission seemed to surprise Rick and she coughed out half a laugh, a little more hysterical sounding that she intended. “Y – yeah, Rick, I know this is my fault. _Everything_ is my fault.”

_She_ was the one who asked Rick to make dad disappear. A sizable part of her thought Rick would _kill_ dad but she’d still begged Rick to take him away.

“I’m a fucking _cancer_ , Rick,” she breathed, realizing the moment she spoke it that it was true. “But that’s – I can live with that. I just – I need to see him, Rick. I need to – _fuck_ I don’t even know what I’m gonna do but I’ve gotta do it or I’ll be carrying this shit around with me for the rest of my life. S - So are you gonna help me or not?”

There was something bleak about the way Rick was boring into her, his eyes wide and unibrow raised as he swam in the waters of her confession. But Morty was beyond caring – beyond embarrassment or shame or some egotistical need to seem less pathetic than she felt. Because this was _a lot_. Almost too much to handle. And Rick could help her or he could not – that was his choice to make – but she was going to find her dad and do her best to speak to him or get arrested and sent to intergalactic prison in the trying.

Rick plucked his flask from his pocket but didn’t break eye-contact as he upended the last of it into his mouth.

“I can probably buy you thr- _eeugh-_ ee minutes – maybe less,” Rick growled, his gaze flashing up to scan the curtained section of the room and the over-alert guards. “Is that gonna – is that enough for you to quit your fucking bitching?”

She snorted, so relieved the feeling bordered on euphoria. “Guess we’ll find out.”

It was Rick’s turn to scoff, and when she made an effort to smile at him, some of the tightness around the corners of his eyes melted away.

“Oka- _aaaaugh_ -y then. Watch for my signal and try not to get us killed.”

Morty swallowed heavily and nodded, not at all prepared for the fact that she would soon be facing off with her dad _alone_.


	21. Chapter Twenty-One

After one long calculating look, Rick shoved Morty towards the row of folding tables nestled in the corner where the curtained-off V.I.P. section met the wall. Morty took three cantering steps, turning back to watch Rick wander into the moving mass of creatures in the center of the walkway.

Within moments he was gone and she was alone, the only force driving her forwards her own wilting determination.

Was she doing the right thing? Was seeing dad – _talking_ to dad – going to fuck her up more than she already was? Maybe. _Probably._ But there was only one way to find out.

Morty straightened her shoulders and took a deep breath.

As she approached the far edge of the V.I.P. curtain, one of the security guards swiveled one of his antennae eyes to her. Carefully, she kept her attention glued on the folding table Rick had pushed her towards watching the lobster-alien from the periphery of her vision.

“Oh, h - hi,” Morty greeted the alien standing stiffly beside a stack of cages stacked on top of the table. Curiously, Morty bent over to peek at the naked-ish round things rolling around inside the carrier cases. “What – what are these?” Morty asked, yanking her fingers away when she gestured to the creature and it turned to unveil a perfectly round mouth lined with four distinct rows of teeth.

“Volubilis Pavor,” the red alien answered but Morty was only half listening, her attention lingering on the guard and the way one antennae eye still twisted in her direction. “I don’t know what I was thinking bringing them here; _huge_ mistake. The general public aren’t ready to appreciate them.” Morty belatedly realized the gap separating the stack of carrier cages and the aliens crowding around the other folding tables shooting the snarling boxes distrustful looks might not be entirely an accident and she took a half step back.

“Why?” Morty asked, trying to wait out the guard’s continued one-eyed staring.

“They’re not popular pets,” the red alien shrugged, expressing something akin to an eye-roll with the two glittering orbs lodged in its transparent face. “On most planets, they’re - ah – what layman generally call ‘a scourge’. You might know them by their other name; the Galmorfian Terror?”

“Oh yeah, I’ve heard of that,” Morty said with half a laugh. “I think some text scam tried to threaten me with one – or uh, _them_ ,” she corrected, dipping down to get a better look at the fleshy balls and circling rows of teeth.

The red alien didn’t look pleased about that, humming a sound of disapproval. “I wanted to show the galaxy that they’re good for more than razing chaos on your enemies, you know? But all I got from the judges was ‘ _monstrous this_ ’ and ‘ _dangerous_ _that_ ’ and ‘ _wildly irresponsible_ _whatever_ ’…”

“That – uh – that really sucks,” Morty said aiming for sympathy but a little too distracted to mean it, jumping back when one of the cages started to rattle, the thing inside ramming its rounded, beady-eyed head against the mesh.

“Yeah and don’t think I haven’t noticed the way everyone keeps eyeing them,” the alien said, turning shifty, huge orbs on Morty suspiciously. “Either terrified or plotting to use them to their own advantage – they’re _very_ hard to catch you know; their hides are so thick they’re completely resistant to any kind of projectile weapon.”

Morty wasn’t entirely listening, her attention drifting again to the security-lobster guarding the V.I.P. entrance. His eye was _still_ on her – but she was starting to suspect he was more focused on the alien fussing over a posse of dangerous, bullet-proof eating-machines.

Her lack of attention must have rankled with the red alien because they lashed out, jabbing Morty hard in the chest with a squishy finger. “Is that why you’re here? You think you can steal them and make a profit?”

“Wha – n – no! I’m – I’ve never even see these things before, I was just curious.” She raised her hands placatingly and backed up a step as the alien unexpectedly advanced on her.

“Yeah that’s what they _all_ say. Just know that the second those cages are opened by anyone but me, they’ll tear the squiglypus right off your scholera.”

“What’s a – what’s a squiglypus?”

“You don’t have a squiglypus?”

“I – I don’t know, I don’t _think_ so...”

The red alien eyed her up and down skeptically. “You must have _some_ sort of genitals…”

“RAPTOR ON THE LOOSE!” a panicked shout interrupted them – in a _very familiar_ rasping voice – and before Morty’s mind had time to put together anything besides ‘ _Rick!_ ’ an honest-to-god _velociraptor_ careened into the throng of creatures, aliens diving out of its way as it snapped at a small hovering bubble of liquid on a string and a cascade of goo hit the floor. “EVERYONE WATCH OUT, THIS THING CAN OPEN DOORS!”

Morty paused for half a second in a kind of out-of-body fugue, distantly wondering ‘ _what the fuck is my life_ ’ before her brain re-started and reminded her that the appearance of a mother-fucking _dinosaur_ probably qualified as Rick’s ‘signal’.

The room devolved into chaos; aliens fled, tables clattered as they were knocked over, the two guards at the V.I.P. entrance abandoned their posts brandishing stun batons, and a cacophony of screams and shouts rose to echo against the high ceiling.

Morty ducked under the table – partially because she knew the whole point of Rick letting loose _a fucking dinosaur_ was so she could get a chance to sneak into the V.I.P. area but also because it felt instinctual when the raptor swung its head around and spotted the creature Morty had just been talking to.

The red alien was trying to juggle five carrying cases and make a break for the nearest exit, but the cages kept rattling and threatening to topple over out.

When three-toed claws turned in her direction and started approaching, she shoved herself under the heavy curtain and wiggled backwards, momentarily snagged and blinded by the lengthy fabric. For one heart-stopping second, she thought she was bound to wind up raptor-food, but she kicked hard with her legs and rolled, coming out gasping on the other side just as a vicious snarl snapped the tension in the air like a twig.

A guttural shriek made Morty scramble to her feet and back up three paces, nearly walking through a nebulous cloud of spores that somehow still managed to look haughty when it gurgled, “V.I.P.s _only_.” Her sudden appearance had attracted the attention of some of surrounding convention-goers but another particularly ear splitting scream from the other side of the curtain left most of them more curious-looking than angry.

“It’s a - a fucking _dinosaur_ -” Morty stammered, addressing the various aliens who apparently qualified as V.I.P.s. Besides the pearly-skinned giant Morty immediately locked onto hovering in the back corner and uninterested in the shrill scream, she recognized one Krutabulon; a host from a show her and Rick occasionally watched when there was nothing better on interdimensional cable. He had a show where he traveled the universe and hunted exotic creatures – sometimes to extinction – like some kind of fucked up, blood-lusty Steve Irwin.

He was the first one to shrug and turn away from Morty and the shouting growing louder just a few feet away. “Something gets loose every year,” he muttered, laying his hand on the shoulder of a much younger female Krutabulon that Morty recognized from the show as his daughter.

“Do we hunt?” the young Krutabulon asked, turning her face up to her father looking wild-eyed and excited.

“It is not _our_ hunt,” he answered, settling himself comfortably on a chair and brushing what looked like a normal earth German Shepard who wagged its tail enthusiastically.

Despite Morty’s dramatic appearance and the obvious fact that she didn’t belong in the V.I.P. section, no one seemed inclined to do anything about her presence. The area was much less crowded than the show floor and most everyone was moving to gather at the curtained entrance, straining to get a look at the carnage.

Morty wasn’t entirely sure why they all seemed to believe a flimsy curtain was enough to keep them safe but at least Rick’s distraction was working. And thankfully the pearly-skinned alien (and hopefully dad) were in the opposite direction than the rampaging dinosaur.

With a slightly hysterical chuckle, Morty backed away from the gathering V.I.P.s and wove through the chairs and tables set up like a grid in the small space.

A glimpse of fleshy peach caught Morty’s attention and she froze, her legs jerking to a halt as two feathered aliens hurried past, their wings brushing Morty’s shoulders, and suddenly she was staring down a row of chairs at _her father_ , naked and sitting on top of a folding table, swinging his legs like a kid at a doctor’s appointment.

Morty spun, putting her back to her dad and trying to calm the intense racing of her heart while she hovered at the edge of the gawkers, trying to blend in as she stole horrified glances at dad. _Oh jeez_. What the hell was she doing? This _was_ a bad idea.

After a few surreptitious looks over her shoulder, she noticed dad’s attention was wholly centered on the giant pearly finger hovering in front of his face and pointing downward, shapely fingers covered in rings.

“ _Stay_ ,” the huge Anaubrian commanded, her voice deep and rich and velvety. From Morty’s angle, it was impossible to get any impression of the woman’s face but dad was staring up at her like she hung the fucking moon. “Stay.”

Dad folded his legs up underneath him and his face crumpled into something babyish and meek when another particularly loud shout cut through the curtain like a knife. The anxious whiny noise he made blindsided Morty – it was _exactly_ the noise he made when he told mom he’d lost his job and she’d blown up at him, the same noise he’d made when he snuck along on an adventure and Rick let the poisonous snake they were hunting take a chunk out of his leg, the same noise he made when he’d stood in the dark of Rick’s bedroom that fateful night, horrified and unable to form a single word to express his disgust with his youngest daughter.

“That’s a good boy,” the massive woman purred, her fist uncurling to run over the top of dad’s head in a soft caress that left him closed-eyed in bliss. Then she bent over and unsheathed a curved knife (big enough to qualify as a sword in anyone else’s hands) and Morty ducked her head trying to stay inconspicuous when the woman turned abruptly and strode past at a determined jog, shoving her way to the front of the throng of V.I.P.s watching the chaos.

Morty waited until the back of the woman’s shimmering hair disappear through the curtain, her breath catching in her throat.

She wasn’t ready for this. She would _never_ be ready for this. How could she be?

The last time she’d seen dad, he was hovering over her where she cowered on Rick’s bed, his eyes doing a terrible up and down of her mostly-naked body like he was taking stock of her – like he could see right through her down to her blackened soul. The green glow of the television made his shock and revulsion look grotesque, his usually friendly face wrong and upsetting while he looped a finger through her panties, pulled them out of – _oh jeez_ – _Rick’s mouth_ , and stared at them in traumatized distaste.

In that moment – in the charged silence of Rick’s bedroom - she had hated dad with every fiber of her being, one massive EMP pulse that shut off all her rational thinking and screamed ‘ _Don’t look at me like that!_ ’

Which was totally unfair, and she knew it only too well half a moment later when all that anger shifted over to the much more familiar territory of self-hatred.

But alone with Rick in the dark, hovering over him on his small cot, she _finally_ had Rick where she wanted him – he was letting her take the lead and set the pace and she was _so close_ to impaling herself on top of him, that disbelieving look of _rapture_ slacking his face telling her she could do _anything_ and _he’d let her_.

And _nobody_ let Morty have her way, not ever, not until Rick and then only on the rare occasions when he was feeling generous.

When her dad walked in, he took that away from her, replacing those good feelings with all the crippling guilt she had put off feeling until he was staring down at her – naked body and soul - curled up at the foot of Rick’s bed and still aching with lust.

Because it wasn’t just _Rick_ doing all the wanting. _It was her too_.

And that shame hadn’t given her a peaceful moment since.

Morty blinked, shaking herself out of her daze. She had made herself forget how _furious_ she was with her dad - the bone-deep remorse of _begging_ Rick to erase him from the picture burying the low heat of those coals under a heavy layer of guilt – but now she realized it had been burning there all this time.

For the first time in _months_ , looking at his stupid new haircut and placid, bored expression and the way he kept sticking his fingers in his mouth, she allowed herself to be angry with him.

It felt surprisingly good.

After a quick glance around Morty approached her father, her steps growing heavier with every foot she set down in his direction. When she was less than ten feet away, he finally noticed her approach, and his head tilted.

“Hi,” he said and Morty’s ankle got caught against the leg of a folding chair, nearly sending her toppling to the floor, the metal clanging loudly. Morty, rushing to disentangle her foot and straighten the chair, frantically glanced behind her at the milling V.I.P., but the sound of the chair scraping against the floor hadn’t been louder than the rending sound of torn fabric cutting through the air and the ragged sound of many voices screaming.

“Wait you – you can _talk_?” Morty stammered, turning back to the uncomfortable scrutiny of dad’s too-innocent eyes.

“Hi,” he said again, the word quick and a little slurred, reminding Morty of the way toddlers shape their first words.

“You – uh - know anything besides ‘hi’?” Morty asked, feeling so unimaginably uncomfortable. She was expecting him to be silent and completely un-reachable, for him to be as stupid as he’d seemed in some of the videos she’d glimpsed on his social media page. It was hard to say if his ability to potentially talk back made things easier or not but she didn’t like the surprise.

“No,” Dad answered, his arms wrapping around himself as he started rocking, a deafening lion’s roar cutting through the dead air.

“ _Oh jeez_ ,” Morty said, more to herself than to dad, who was still watching her with interest. He held out a hand towards her, and even though she was acutely aware of how naked he was and how spit-drenched his fingers were and that itchy memory of robot-dad and his late night visit in the bunker that might have been based on something real, she stepped into his reach and let him brush his hand over her hair in a sloppy pet.

Dad had her coloring - it was what everyone pointed out her whole fucking life, sometimes even going so far as to say they looked like each other. She had never liked the comparison but it was a hard observation to disagree with. It was probably his fault she had bland-brown hair that couldn’t decide if it wanted to be curly or not. And he had the same brown eyes that she saw when she looked in the mirror - though the cagey, almost calculative gleam that used to sparkle through on occasion was lost to a dull sort of friendliness. It wasn’t a _bad_ look for him but the difference was unmistakable.

Those eyes dropped to the collar around Morty’s neck and dad’s free hand raised to prod at his own collar. Up close, Morty could see it was a soft, dark green adorned with a bow – clearly more form than function – and when he stroked the smooth fabric, it was with an adoring sort of fondness that made Morty cringe.

The man in front of her wasn’t her dad anymore. Not _really_. If everything was gone, all the memories of his life on Earth - all the bullshit sales techniques and opinions about American Idol contestants and meandering stories that never reached a point – if he had been wiped down to a clean slate, the person who was _her dad_ was gone too.

Morty swallowed thickly and half-heartedly batted his hand away from her hair.

What a sneaky loop-hole Rick had found – a way to kill a man without killing him. And Morty, irrationally – _horrifically_ \- found she wasn’t as unhappy with the solution as she knew she should have been.

“Pretty,” dad said simply, ignoring the way she’d pushed him away and grabbing at a fistful of her curls. Her eyes watered from the sting and the overwhelming surge of memories.

Dad hadn’t always been the worst – he was even almost okay for a while. He used to take her out for breakfast on her birthdays, just the two of them, and let her order ice cream on her waffles. She’d sit next to him and watch him build little model cars in his study late at night when mom was drunk and loud and angry, the quiet atmosphere of the den a blessed reprieve. And if she really dug for them, she even had some vague images of him leaning over her to tuck her into bed at night, kissing her forehead when he wished her goodnight.

But those good memories felt distant and foggy compared to what she remembered much more clearly: his face dripping wine and twisted up in fury, the bland disappointed look he didn’t bother reigning in when she handed him her report card, that confused twist of disgust made worse by the sharp exposure of flickering TV light.

Looking at him now, his neutral face leaning towards smiling, a healthy sheen to the shine of his admittedly empty eyes, Morty knew she couldn’t – _she wouldn’t_ – bring this man back with her. If he had been needy and annoying before, this new version of him would be unbearable.

Mom had a whole new life ahead of her – she was about to move off planet and go to medical school – she wouldn’t have the time to take care of an adult-sized toddler. Summer had barely tolerated dad when he was fully functioning, she’d probably never visit home again if this man-child haunted the house.

And there was _no way_ Morty could handle him alone – not with the way his eyes had drifted down from her collar to gape at the low neckline of her shirt, his too strong hand still wound in her hair.

“I - I’ve gotta –” she finally stammered out, too aware that she only had a few minutes, her mouth dry and her voice thick. She swiped at her cheeks with her forearm and squared her shoulders. “Dad, there’s some stuff I should say…”

She tried again to brush his hand away from where it was still tangled in her hair but he yanked at it instead, and his arms had significantly more strength behind them than the average baby. Morty grimaced, gritting her teeth while she pinched his hand until he let go with a whiny “Owwie!”

“ _Listen_ dad, I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry you’re – that you’re _like this_ now,” she gestured to him - to his nude body, to his finely styled hair, to the green collar, to the childish brain trapped in an adult body. Dad had tucked the skin she pinched against his mouth, wide brown eyes staring at her reprovingly. An animal screech sounded from the other side of the curtain and he flinched again.

Morty rolled her eyes and took a step back, inhaling deeply, trying to visualize the poison seeping out of her pores as she admitted the things she’d been bottling up for entirely too long.

“Everyone –” she bit her lip and let herself finally admit that Rick had been right. “- everyone _is_ a lot happier now. Mom’s going to become a doctor and Summer’s off exploring the galaxy and – and it’s _good_ for them.”

Dad blinked dolefully, his fingers fiddling with the green bow at his neck.

“And I’m –” she swallowed, forcing herself to cough it out – to tell _someone_ – and she _never in a million years_ thought it would be dad on the receiving end of the statement that summed up so much of her life but he was the best candidate to keep an awful secret because he _couldn’t understand_.

“ _I’m with Rick now_ ,” she said decisively and _wow_ did it feel good to say that out loud. She didn’t know what her and Rick were - there wasn’t some convenient title to describe their relationship – but whatever they were, she was _with_ him now. She hoped _desperately_ that she would be for the rest of her (probably short) life. “Dad, I – I’m in love with Rick.”

Dad pulled his legs up to his chest and hugged them (Morty very pointedly kept her eyes on his face lest she see anything she’d have to beg Rick to erase later) but his attention was still glued on her, even as something metal and heavy clattered just on the other side of the curtain. “Rick,” he parroted back, and Morty swallowed heavily.

“Yeah, _Rick_.” His name had power, seemingly even over dad, who started gnawing on his finger nails. “That’s why you’re _here_. Cause I – I’d rather give you up than lose Rick.” The ugly truth of that statement felt diminished when it was finally said out loud. She was terrible and awful and so _so_ selfish but maybe she was allowed to be. “And that’s not fair to you but you seem –” dad’s pointer finger found his nose and started picking “- happy too. And it’s fucked up _yeah_ for sure, but – but _everything_ is fucked up in one way or another and – and life is short and miserable and fucking _meaningless_ so maybe the best we can do is take our happiness where we can find it.”

She was panting, her dad staring back at her vacantly. “Still, I’m sorry. You weren’t a great dad but… you probably didn’t deserve this.”

Dad’s fingers went straight from his nose to his mouth but Morty ploughed on. After all, this wasn’t for him, it was for _her._

“I – me and Rick will watch out for mom and Summer so you – you know – don’t have to worry. We’ll – we’ll be okay.”

She breathed out a chuckle - warm relief flooding her system like water bursting through a broken pipe - and repeated back the words in wonder. “ _We’ll be okay._ ”

And they _would_ be. She _knew_ they would be - could feel it the sameway she felt Rick when he walked into a room - some instinct guiding her in the right direction when she’d spent so long lost in the woods. Mom and Summer would be okay because she’d shape the universe to _make_ it so. With Rick’s help, she could do _anything_.

After Morty breathed out a long, gut-deep sigh, she realized the screaming from the other side of the curtain had died down, replaced with the quiet murmuring of approaching conversation. The gathered group of V.I.P.s were dispersing, the escaped velociraptor apparently subdued, and Morty knew her time was up.

Morty ran the back of her wrist over her cheek to smear away the stray tears, her heart clenching at the small, sympathetic hum he made in her direction, his hand petting over her hair lightly on last time before she stepped back and did her best to screw on a watery smile. “Take care, dad,” too aware that those would be the last words she’d probably ever speak to him and bizarrely at peace with that.

The sound of voices grew louder as V.I.P.s filtered back into their space and Morty speed walked to the curtained doorway, weaving through aliens and swiping at her cheeks.

Before she considered the wisdom in doing it, she turned back to dad one last time, the thin sheen of tears coating her eyes blurring the image she was trying to burn into her memory.

His face was so much less lined than it had been when he’d been prowling the Smith family house – tortured into pitifulness by a hateful wife, a father-in-law breathing down his neck, and two kids who never lived up to what he wanted them to be.

Now there was someone who loved him - she could see it in the healthy flush of his skin and the sheen of his hair and the way he sat; fearlessly confident of his own worth.

He was better of here too – she was _sure_ of it – and she turned away before the insane, almost weightless-feeling of relief left her bereft and indecisive.

She had nearly reached the curtain, her thoughts absently turning to how she would find Rick when a giant pearly hand parted the fabric blocking her exit and Morty made _electric_ , too-close eye-contact with the giant pearly woman.

Morty’s head had to tilt back to take her in, both of them still with shock and nearly nose to navel. The woman’s eyes were silver – the kind of silver clouds were after a heavy rain. She was round cheeked and cheery looking, everything in her face reading _kind_ and _gentle_ like the words had been printed across her forehead.

And with a sinking sense of dread, Morty realized the woman was looking _right at her_ \- right _through_ her - seemingly reading all her secrets like they were a fucking book, because after the tiniest pause and the slight dimming of her smile, the woman laid a heavy hand on Morty’s shoulder, rooting her in place.

“You look familiar, little human,” the Anaubrian woman said quietly, her voice a pleasant rumble. She crouched down to one knee and Morty hated the obvious way her glance cut from Morty’s face to a place over Morty’s shoulder – where dad still sat on the folding table. Morty couldn’t risk turning, trying to put as much mental space between her and her father as possible, so she caught the meloncholy in the woman’s frown before she covered it with something open-minded. “And you seem sad.”

“Oh – uh – nope, I’m just a – a normal human,” Morty insisted, bunching up her muscles to get ready to flee. “We all look like this.”

“Hmm…” the giant woman hummed, her gaze dropping to the collar. “Lost?” she wondered aloud, before something shrewd but concerned wrinkled her brow. “Or did you do the finding?”

And god, her eyes – they were like whirlpools just _begging_ to be drowned in – but Morty was no stranger to a penetrating gaze.

“ _Nope_ ,” she squeaked, hating how high her voice was.

“You remind me of my human,” the woman said lightly, reaching out a long arm and dragging a folding chair over, lowering herself into it gracefully. It was almost comically small for her and even seated, she _still_ towered over Morty, but her posture was relaxed and open. This massive woman who could probably suffocate Morty in her noticeable cleavage was clearly doing her best to look small and unintimidating but the thought only put Morty more on edge, her eyes darting to the curtained entrance just a few feet away.

“O – oh?” Morty said non-committally, too aware of the hand still on her shoulder holding her in place.

“A little smarter, maybe.” Morty tried not to blush but no one had ever used the word ‘ _smart_ ’ to describe her before and the stress of the situation had already colored her cheeks. “Smaller and younger, too. You know, I never looked for his family – my little Dummy, I mean.”

Morty swallowed her overwhelming sense of dread.

“He just showed up one day, wandered into my backyard, barely able to hold himself up.” The woman finally released Morty’s shoulder to lean back and cross her legs, sounding unbearably fond, her eyes distant.

And Morty screamed at her legs to run – to flee, to get her the _fuck out of there_ – but they refused to obey her silent commands, leaving her standing there stupidly, unable to tear her attention away from the soft, melodic voice.

“I was going through something at the time,” the Anaubrian continued. “A real existential crisis I guess, and every day seemed worse than the one before. I was so self-destructive it bordered on suicidal and no matter where I looked, all I saw was the worst things life had to offer.”

Morty shuffled her feet and hugged her elbows to her chest watching the woman’s eye’s refocus on her with a bright spark of joy.

“But then this little creature wandered into my life, this thing that _needed_ me and _loved_ me and gave me a reason to get out of cryo-freeze in the morning.” She laughed, the sound small and private and it was hard to image this soft, nurturing woman ever being as jaded as she’d just described, but Morty knew better than most that _everyone_ had hidden depths. “I should have tried to find where he came from, I should have put up posters or reported him to the Federation or had his blood tested for evidence of a home-world at least… but I didn’t want to give him up.”

The woman reached out slowly and pulled Morty’s much smaller hands gently in her own. Morty tilted her head down to wonder at the comparison – the beautiful glittery sheen of her palms, the six slender fingers, the thick loops of rings. Without meaning to, Morty’s rough hands traced the woman’s massive lifeline before she swallowed heavily and allowed herself to be sucked into the deep grey depths of the Anaubrian woman’s eyes.

“I _still_ don’t want to lose him,” she admitted softly, he huge thumbs swiping gently over the backs of Morty’s hands. The words weren’t a command or a threat. They were spoken flatly, like an unarguable truth. Like a request she knew she shouldn’t make but couldn’t help but try. Morty cleared her throat and tried to unstick her tongue from the roof of her mouth.

“You –” Morty had to cough to clear her throat again. “You should keep an eye on his blood pressure. And I don’t know if you have bananas or something kind of like that where you come from but he – he might have an allergy. A – a lot of humans do. And don’t teach him how to use the phone – he’s got this – you know what, _just don’t_. Trust me.”

Those sky-grey eyes swam with tears. Lightly, Morty squeezed the tips of the woman’s fingers and then hurried away unhindered, refusing to turn around and look back.

When Morty slipped out from the curtained doorway of the V.I.P section, she breathed out a long sigh, letting all her worries and fears and doubts about dad leak out of her with the heavy exhalation.

Rick was right. He was better off there, with that huge woman who clearly loved him and cherished him and spoiled him in all the ways he’d always wished mom would. She would take care of him, give him a new lifetime of memories, help him learn and adapt and maybe this time he’d be happier.

Morty felt _light_ for the first time in more than half a year - since everything shifted three feet to the left and she was left to stumble around in the dark. She hadn’t realized how heavy the burden of her guilt had been, her remorse a constant strain around her neck. Her hands idly lifted to feel for the metaphysically missing weight but her fingers only landed on the collar.

Rick wasn’t a good guy. And what he did to dad was _fucked up_. But Morty had _shot_ people – people she didn’t know, people who had names and lives and families – to keep Rick alive, to keep Rick _with_ her. And she’d do it again in a heartbeat, she’d do it every day, she’d _bathe_ in the blood of Rick’s enemies if it meant his heart kept on beating at that weirdly steady pace.

So who was she to play the moral police?

As if thinking of him conjured him up like magic, the crowd of bustling aliens parted to reveal Rick, feigning casual as he leaned against the wall where they’d last parted. Their gaze met across the room and everything else blurred away when he focused his voltaic eyes on her. She watched the hard line of tension in his shoulders melt, his brooding glare morph into a carefully neutral glower. His arms unfolded as he kicked off from the wall to meet her in the middle of the traveling mass of creatures, the milling crowd reduced to a blur of color in comparison to the high-definition detail of Rick’s familiar, lined face.

There was a hint of trouble around the tightness of his mouth - the way he worked his jaw behind closed lips like he had something bitter to spit out - but he walled it up behind a mostly neutral glower as his eyes narrowed, darting between her features before settling on her eyes.

He brushed a hand over her bangs to smooth them out, and grunted, “You good?” the sardonic edge not entirely masking his concern. And she loved him so much in that moment – loved him for his terrible acting and his gruff façade and his stupid emotional constipation – that she leaned up on her toes and pressed a kiss to chin, the only part of his face she could reach if he didn’t bend down to meet her halfway.

Rick held still as she pulled away, his brow furrowed until she beamed a slightly watery smile up at him.

“Yeah, Rick. I’m good,” she answered and _jeez_ did she mean it. She had never been so good in her entire life. She was with Rick and she didn’t need to worry about her dad and she was surrounded by the most vibrant display of diversity the universe had to offer. Things had never been better.

“Ab- _ooough-_ out fucking time,” he bit back without any of his usual harshness, a skeptical look lowering his unibrow into a V before he shook it off with a light chuckle.

When she reached for his hand, she was surprised that he let her thread their fingers together without any grousing. He usually only let her get away with that when they were someplace safe - a million lectures about needing his hands free if he had to reach for a weapon echoing around in her head - but he gave her palm a little squeeze back and ducked to press a quick kiss to her forehead before he started tugging her towards the show floor doors.

“Then let’s get the fu- _uuugh-_ ck out of here.”

It was only then that Morty realized the scene she’d stepped into was vastly different from the one she’d left behind.

The area was a disaster. Tables were overturned and bent out of shape, empty crates were scattered all over the floor bearing three-slitted claw marks, and a whole wall of curtains had been torn down into a jagged pile of metal bars and shredded fabric. Aliens wandered the area in varying degrees of shock, clutching traumatized pets to their sides. The injured moaned and groaned from wherever they had fallen and Rick had to take Morty on a wide circle to avoid a pool of purple/black blood dotted with chunks of viscera.

An army of little hovering metal droids rushed around fixing tables and re-hanging curtains and air-lifting the wounded away while a few indifferent looking guards supervised. Morty was reminded of what that famous Krutabulon said – how something like this happened every year – and she had to admit, they must have been somewhat prepared because they were making quick work of the cleanup.

Still, Morty’s good mood faded ever so slightly.

“Holy shit, Rick, did you need to cause a fucking _massacre_?” she complained, tightening her fingers on his hand as they passed a small blue ape-child who was sobbing loudly and openly while three droids hovered nearby trying to sooth it with trilling robotic beeping. When that only made the kid wail harder, they wrapped mechanical tentacles around the child’s waist and hefted it into the air, soaring out of sight.

“What do you want me to say, Morty?” He turned briefly to cut her a look over his shoulder. “I saw a dinosaur in an unlocked cage and I’m not known for impulse control.”

“ _Okay_ …” she breathed, digesting the absurdity. That… unfortunately made a lot of sense. And it was hard to argue with the recklessly destructive side of Rick. He had calmed down _a little_ from when they started going on adventures – back then he’d start fires just to watch them burn, half because _he_ wanted to burn with them – and Morty knew better than anyone that some part of him would _always_ be a lit match... “ _but still_ -”

“- _Still_ you got your distraction, Morty,” he spoke over her, his voice regaining some edge. “What are you complaining about?”

“All the – Rick!” she snapped, glaring around at the destruction. They passed an insectoid alien crying into the mane of a very tired looking lion with a bandage wrapped around its paw. A hovering droid started siphoning a smear of blood of the floor with a little vacuum attachment. The red, translucent alien Morty had spoken to earlier stumbled by shouting ‘ _Snuggles! Mr. Muffin! Glorbaforb! Where are you!_ ’ One arm ended in a bandaged stump and the other was rattling an empty carrier case.

She gestured blandly to the surrounding carnage behind Rick’s back. “ _All the people who got hurt_!” she emphasized, once she remembered she could use her voice.

“Gotta break a few eggs, Morty.” Rick shrugged stiffly without turning around. They jerked to a halt while something as big as an elephant but _scaly_ slowly crossed their path.

Rick’s weight shifted from leg to leg, his foot tapping against the ground while his fingers tightened around her hand in an angry little clench. He hummed briefly like he wanted to lay into her but decided against it at the last minute.

When he started over again, she had to strain to hear him over the surrounding crowd because he had turned his head away. “You talked to Jerry, right? Isn’t that what you wanted?” As if to erase the vulnerability _just barely_ leaking into his voice, he quickly amended, “Or should I call him Dum Dum now?” He shot her an appraising glance from the corner of his eye and strode off again, tugging her in his wake. “And judging from the way you left him there without any complaint, you must have figured out for yourself how much better off he is now, isn’t that right, _Mooooorty_?”

Was he… was this Rick’s way of asking how things went? Was he _worried_ about her? It seemed unlikely - Rick wasn’t exactly known for checking in with her emotionally – but if he was… _wow._

“He – uh yeah. He seemed okay,” she conceded, feeling irrationally endeared by the way Rick’s tight clench on her hand loosened infinitesimally.

“I don’t want to be cliché but I can’t pass a chance to say _I told you so_.” He was being a jerk ( _as always_ ) but she couldn’t stop a smile that was entirely too fond from quirking up the corners of her mouth.

“And I talked to his - his person or owner or whatever. That Anaubrian lady.” Judging from the way Rick’s eyebrow climbed his forehead, he hadn’t expected that. He shot her another look over his shoulder and she shrugged. “I – I think she’ll take care of him. Better than, you know, mom or anyone on earth ever would. She was nice.”

“That’s an understatement. She must have the patience of a fucking saint to put up with _Jerry_.”

The raptor destruction gradually decreased as they maneuvered through the huge room until they turned a corner around a curtained wall and spotted the show floor doors. Her relief at being so close to the exit was short lived when she realized that the entrance was no longer flanked by low ranking security guards but overrun with Federation Gromflomites, cradling laser rifles as they surveyed the exiting crowd.

“ _Well fuck_ ,” Rick hummed low under his breath, head twisting back and forth, looking for a way to turn around, but they were being swept along with the throng, nothing but bodies pressing in on either side of them. “Just play it cool, Morty, and keep your head down.”

Morty did just that, ducking her head and willing herself to phase into the crowd. It helped that she was smaller than most of the surrounding creatures and Rick slowed their pace until they were sandwiched between a blue, eight foot sasquatch on one side and some hulking and vaguely camel-shaped thing on the other. They were decently corralled, and didn’t seem to be attracting any attention, but Morty’s heart was still determined to pound hard enough her chest ached.

She spared a glance at Rick, who unwove his fingers from hers to wrap them around her wrist like a vice. His face was lax and broadcasting ‘carefully bored’ so loud she could practically read the words off his forehead but Morty knew him well enough to recognize that he was counting enemies when he swept his eyes over the room in a calculated glance.

The wall of Feds wasn’t exactly something Morty was thrilled about but they’d gotten themselves into ( _and out of_ ) worse situations. Admittedly, she very much regretted leaving her blaster at home – she dimly remembered setting it down on her nightstand the night before and hadn’t even _thought_ about it when she’d dragged herself out of bed that morning – but Rick probably had a weapon (or seven) somewhere in his seemingly bottomless pockets and with his intellect, they were never completely helpless.

Still… there were _a lot_ of Feds and only the two of them.

The exit flanked by Gromflomites was approaching, and luckily the converging crowd had to bottleneck to fit through the doors. Morty dropped her eyes to the floor and did her best to exude _unimpressive pet_ with every pore of her being - something made easier by the jostling aliens on either side of her sweeping her along with the tide.

Rick’s fingers dug into the skin of her arm hard enough to bruise but it was a reassuring point of contact when she chanced a peek and noticed one of the uniformed Feds turn their head in her direction – the target of their glare less obvious thanks to their multifaceted eyes – but her sweating palms and palpitating heart were for nothing when a moment later the bug swiveled his head over the rest of the crowd on another apparently meaningless sweep.

She was so relieved to be out the other side of the check point that she barely noticed they had already made it back to the elevator, Rick jabbing the down button repeatedly while he breathed out a steady sigh. Morty glanced up, trying to gauge his expression – he was still glaring behind them at the throng of Federation bugs though none of them were paying the two humans any mind – but he looked more annoyed and vaguely cocky than Morty could relate to while she was still trying to convince her heart it was overreacting.

“See, Morty,” he said, that too-pleased-with-himself smile making her stomach do a funny little flip. He dropped the vice grip he had on her wrist to ruffle her hair, the other hand bracing itself on his hip. “No big deal.”

“THERE HE IS!” a voice shouted and both of them flinched and spun. A small, grey alien - glassy black eyes fogged over with tears - was pointing at Rick from across the room, its booming voice parting the sea of creatures. A transparent cage hovered beside it, a sleeping, _heavily bandaged_ velociraptor crumpled up against the bottom of the bars. “IT WAS THAT GUY - HE LET MY WUFFLES OUT!”

Rick raised one hand supplicatingly, his face loosening up into that ‘ _I’m just an easy going dude_ ’ expression that had gotten him out of plenty of sticky situations, while the hand behind his back insistently pressed at the down button. The surrounding crowd started grumbling angrily – a few too many of them bearing bandages or bruises of their own – and Morty’s adrenaline spiked back into high gear. Together, her and Rick had been on the receiving side of _too many_ angry mobs for her to delude herself into thinking this was ending any way but bad.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about –” Rick started, trailing off when it became obvious at least three Feds were trying to shoulder their way through the gathered aliens. A more determined Gromflomite broke through into the no-man’s land between Rick and Morty and _everyone else_ , but before his rifle swung towards them, Rick switched gears to “- MORTY, RUN!” and her body jerked into motion like it had been itching for the command.

Morty had a two second head start for the simple reason that she’d been standing closer to the door marked ‘stairwell’ when they both snapped into action but Rick’s longer legs outpaced her quickly. It was good he did – a huge Gazorpian woman tried to block their path but Rick took a flying leap off the vase of a potted plant, using his momentum to bowl her over and out of their way. Morty had to duck to dodge a swipe from a huge muscled arm that came out of nowhere – the move instinctual and punctuated by an automatic high pitch shriek she’d be embarrassed about later - but Rick had already pried open the stairwell door and with one strong yank, tugged her through.

Then they were careening down the steps, turning onto the second flight of stairs before the door on the landing above them crashed open, a deep voice bellowing, “FEDERATION POLICE! FREEZE!”

“Make me, dickwad!” Rick shouted back, catching Morty by the arm before she tumbled down the stairs and steering her through a door marked in alien script.

Rick stopped so abruptly on the other side that Morty toppled over, catching herself on hands and knees, palms stinging where they skidded against the floor. Rick was standing sentinel at the door, yanking it closed _right_ as the Gromflomite’s wiggly mandibled face popped up in the stairwell window. With a victorious crow, Rick pulled something small and metal from his pocket and slapped it against the center of the door. When it hit the surface it expanded - striated metal arms stretched out, some wrapping around the push bar, others drilling into the door frame with an electric whir that echoed down the dim, flickering hallway.

Morty breathed out a sigh of relief. They were barricaded in, that bought them more than enough time to duck out of sight and shoot a portal. She pushed herself up to her knees, laughing a little at the bright contagious smile on Rick’s face as he gave the Gromflomite the middle finger salute.

Her laughter died unexpectedly in her throat when a niggling shiver ran down her spine, her body flashing cold and then hot as a new wave of adrenaline coursed through her blood.

The hallway was just as creepy as it had been the first time they were down there, dim flickering florescent lights trailing down the hall, rows of dark open doorways lining the walkway. But something was _wrong_ – she felt it, somehow sensed it – even though she hadn’t figured out what it was yet.

Morty ignored the pounding and angry yelling as the Gromflomite in the stairwell started tugging furiously at the door and cursing, her ears straining to hear anything else, her eyes searching the darkness of the room she was still half collapsed in front of.

“Time to bust the fuck out -” Rick started but Morty furiously shushed him when a sudden hissing snarl echoed from the open door to her left and he trailed off, “- of… here…” nearly ending on a question.

The room was dark – _pitch_ dark – and even though everything in Morty’s body was telling her to stand up, to start running, to stop gaping into the blackness trying to make out whatever _new_ threat they’d stumbled across, her arms and legs wouldn’t obey. Not until two tiny pin-pricks of red-ish yellow appeared in the dark - two coin-bright eyes gleaming with reflected light. When another two blinked into existence against the black, she gasped. Another pair appeared, and then another and another, until Morty was staring down _five sets_ of small eyes laser focused on her unblinkingly.

“- _Rick_ ,” she tried to warn him and something in her tone broke them _both_ out of their stupor and he was hauling her to her feet before she’d finished breathing his name.

“ _Run_!” he ordered again, her legs scrambling underneath her to catch traction on the smooth tiles. A glance over her shoulder proved her worst fears right. The escaped Volubi-whatevers - the rumored _Galmorfian Terror -_ was chasing after them, nipping at their heels with teeth so razor sharp Morty barely even felt the bites until the hot stream of her own blood dripped down her calves.

Keeping pace with her, Rick pulled a laser pistol from his pocket and turned, shooting at the clamoring fleshy balls, but the blasts bounced off their wrinkled skin, the light and violence seemingly driving them into a frenzy. Their pace doubled, their bouncing turning wild as they ricocheted off the walls and ceiling, gaining ground.

A heavy ball of thick skin and teeth latched onto Morty’s calf, a pained shriek tearing out of her even as she continued to run, the added weight sending her off kilter, her arms catching her against the wall before she stumbled.

“ _Morty!_ ”

One second she was running and the next she was staggering sideways, her momentum and adrenaline carry her at least ten feet before she toppled over. It wasn’t until she hit the ground that she realized Rick had shoved her into a dark room and was slamming the door behind them, a Terror latched onto his arm. He’d managed to split up the pursuing crowd, two distinct sets of thuds pounding against the door, but a quick count left one unaccounted for – one that Morty spotted as it bounced off the far wall looking dazed before it noticed her face was perfectly on level with its swirling vortex of teeth, and it started careening towards her.

Its outermost jaws snapped less than an _inch_ from Morty’s nose when Rick punted the thing across the room mid-leap. She scrabbled at the one at her calf – the one that was taking meaningful, messy bites out of her leg and making its way up to her thigh – but she only got the side of her palm bitten for her trouble. She dimly remembered the red alien’s threat about genitalia and renewed her useless shoving with fervor as it started taking chunks out of her upper leg.

There was _a lot_ of blood, _too much_ blood, and her leg was nothing but a searing live wire of agony insistent enough to register over all the adrenaline coursing through her veins. Rick had pulled a different gun out of his pocket – his second favorite plasma ray – and he ignored the creature chomping down his own arm to shoot three hot, red blasts of energy at the one currently chewing the back of her knee, the heat of the blasts singeing the frayed edges of her jeans, but its thick hide repelled the lasers.

Despite the pain that had Morty convulsing on the ground, she wracked her brain. There was something she knew – something that alien had told her, the red one stupid enough to keep these monsters as pets. Something about –

“You can’t shoot them!” she shouted, her voice mostly a whine. Morty tried to strain her eyes through the gloom of the room, desperately searching for – for _something_ , for anything, for something heavy to smash it with or something long enough to pry between their teeth - but the only shine illuminated by the light sneaking in under the door was the glinting eyes of the third Terror - recovered from its unexpected flight across the room and reorienting itself to sprint over and tear her face off.

“Fine,” Rick said, huffing out something that almost sounded like a laugh but Morty had already started to scream, the third creature bouncing towards her, its sharp teeth sparkling in the dark like stars. “ _Time to get hands on_ …”

The creature dove again for Morty’s head and she recoiled, covering her head with both arms, but the horrible tearing of flesh (besides the agony endlessly spiking from her leg) never came. Instead she heard Rick grunt, something wet _shlick_ ing against the floor, a terrible cracking of bone, and a high-pitched squeal that raised all the hair on Morty’s arms before it trailed off into eerie silence.

Then the teeth that had been buried in her thigh started slowly unclenching, more of that high-pitched shrieking rending the air, and Morty peeked around her arms. Rick had both his hands on the Terror attached to her leg, prying open its jaw with nothing but his two bare hands – or rather, that’s what she _thought_ was happening until she caught sight of a silvery glint.

One of his hands – _no,_ she blinked dazedly and recalibrated her thought - _his whole arm_ was _metal_. Where his coat sleeve and sweater and _skin_ used to be was a mess of blood and silver, the ragged remains of all three torn off above his elbow like he was a robot wearing a flesh t-shirt.

The interlocking metal joints of his forearm _rippled_ as he flexed, elegant silver fingers curving as he lifted the squirming creature away from her mangled leg, one hand on each half of its hinged open jaw.

Then he _tore the Terror in half_ like it was nothing - like the thick leathery hide was as flimsy as paper. The wet, cracking, tearing, _screaming_ noise made Morty cringe but it was impossible to feel bad for the thing when a quick scan of her leg told her it had been trying its hardest to eat her alive.

Distantly Morty registered that someone else was screaming, and it took Morty longer than it should have to realize there were voices on the other side of the door raising into shouts, footsteps thundering down the hall in every direction and the sharp blasts of rifles firing. Her head was spinning – from adrenaline or blood loss or shock, it was hard to tell – and she _knew_ the sounds in the hallway were a problem, and they needed to get out of there, but mostly she felt too dizzy to think.

Rick made quick work of the last Galmorfian Terror still clinging to his shoulder, his eyes sparkling in the dark when he tossed the carcass away, his face streaked with dark splotches of blood. Morty was panting, staring up at where he hovered over her, silver arm twisting as he shook viscera off his metal hand, the fingers of his other hand were torn and raged, a series of small flashes hinting at shiny bones beneath when he clenched his fist.

He looked feral – he _was_ feral, he had just torn three animals apart _with his bare hands_ – but even sitting in a pool of (mostly) her own blood with her leg nothing but a searing mass of agony, she was pretty sure she could have gazed up at him for _hours._ Or maybe that was just the blood loss talking.

“ _Holy shit, Rick_ ,” she breathed, utterly awed and horrified, her body impractically trying to inch towards turned on but too damaged to properly amp itself up. Still she filed the image away in the back of her head, Rick grinning wickedly and covered in blood having just saved her ass _again_. She might not get much use out of it now but maybe later…

The smirk he turned down to her was rabid - all sharp, crooked teeth and eyes that that told her he’d already read her mind.

“Let’s get the fuck out of here, bud,” he said, his voice a gravely purr. He bent at the waist and helped her to her one good leg – the other nothing but a white hot coil of pain when she rested any weight on it – his thin metal fingers strong and unexpectedly warm where they grabbed her by the elbow and steadied her when the world threatened to tilt away.

“Morty. _Morty_ – come on, stay with me,” a voice insisted and her eyes snapped open. She hadn’t remembered closing them. But Rick’s voice was bright and loud in her head and he sounded – it _almost_ sounded like – he hadn’t sounded like that since…

She wobbled in his hold, the blurry green glow of a portal opening up in front of them, and she was dizzy, _so_ dizzy, and starting to feel a little nauseous – or maybe a _lot_ nauseous, maybe she was going to puke right there onto her own gored open leg. The room was spinning and she couldn’t hold herself up anymore, her face smearing into Rick’s chest and the blood that it had collected, and she was pretty sure she was about to pass out, an arm snaking around her waist and reassuring her that it was probably fine if she did.

Rick was there. He’d catch her before she hit the ground. He’d probably patch her up while she was out too. She was _safe_ with him. He would _keep_ her safe.

An indistinct shout behind them made Rick spin, the move dragging her along with him. A blur of green and red and dark blue swam in front of them and belatedly Morty put it together; the Federation bugs had caught up to them – a handful of them were spilling through the doorway like sand – some looking worse for wear themselves, bite marks dripping thick blue goop.

Like a dream - _like a memory from not so very long ago_ ; a sunny day, a jittering blaster in her hand, Rick at her back - Morty had a crystal clear view of a rifle being raised, the black hole of the barrel staring her down, aimed right between her eyes. And she was so dizzy, so weightless already, her brain foggy and slow. She should do something, she should shout or move or _care_ , but all she could think was ‘ _better me that Rick._ ’

The arm around her waist vanished, a metal hand pressing against her sternum in one solid push that sent her staggering back, the pain of carrying weight on her damaged leg making white lights spark across her vision. She had an out-of-focus view of Rick’s familiar back – the stretch of his lab coat over his prominent shoulder blades, the mess of wiry hair, the faintest curve of his jaw clenched tight – before the raucous _bang_ of a shot split the air, and she slipped through the thin film of particles, the scene dissolving through a green swirl.

She was falling in slow motion – the sight of the steepled roof and wooden crossbeams and bare tungsten bulb doing less to orient her than the ozone/whiskey/oil smell.

The garage door was closed and the only light that filtered in was the line of sunshine that snuck in around the cracks. It made the thin film of dust and metal filings clogging the air shine in dappled shades of gold and silver. Compared to the darkness of the underground room, it was nearly blinding.

She hit the ground hard, landing flat on her back, and the impact sped things up again, forced her to gasp in one huge, shuddering inhale that smelled like home. It was so familiar and safe she nearly sobbed.

Then Rick slumped through the portal, hitting the ground next her with a fearsome _thud_ , the portal gun skidding out of his loose grasp and sliding halfway across the room while the swirl of green at their feet irised closed with an almost silent whoosh that felt too loud in the cripplingly still silence.

“ _Rick_ ,” Morty gasped, her weak arm seeking him out, feeling for him blindly, shoving at a shoulder that was nothing but dead weight. He had landed on his side, his back facing her, and tears made the blurry white slump of his prone form swim.

It took more energy than Morty had, but she dragged herself up enough to latch onto him, turning him over, the desperate shout of ‘ _Rick!_ ’ getting lost in her throat when his head lolled towards her like dead weight.

His eyes were open – that was the first useless thing her brain put together – then the thought corrected itself. His _left eye_ was open. The other had been _shot through_.

Morty was suddenly gasping for air, panic and terror and anguish making it hard to suck in enough oxygen to keep her brain from overheating and shutting itself down. And she hated herself – _hated herself_ – because she couldn’t hear anything over her own rasping throat, even when she pressed an ear to Rick’s chest and then dipped her cheek next to his nose and open mouth hoping to feel him breathe, her fingers scrabbling first at his metal arm then for his flesh wrist and grasping for a pulse.

But her heart was beating too hard for her to hear or feel anything besides the deafening pounding in her own head. She was delirious, and the edges of her vision were starting to tunnel, and this was _impossible_. Rick couldn’t be _dead_. Not like this. _Not because of her_. No. No no no no no no _no no no no NO_!

She dragged herself to the portal gun, wracking her panic bleary brain – where could they go, who could help them? Hyperion Hospital had patched her up when she should have died but… she only knew the coordinates to a few places – this garage being one of them. Someplace so random, someplace she’d only been once – _twice technically_ – she couldn’t even guess.

There was probably something in the garage that could help him and she leveraged herself onto her one good leg, tearing through the shelf of abandoned inventions, swiping item after item off the shelf but she didn’t know what she was looking for – it wasn’t like Rick labeled his shit and he’d been _shot in the head_. What fixed that?!

She glanced over at him once again - at his too-still body, at the flickering sparks of metal in his eye socket. The room smelled like burnt blood.

Why was so much of him metal? For one horrible moment she wished – _desperately hoped_ – that somehow he’d swapped himself out with robot-Rick, but she knew down to her very core that it was absolutely _her_ Rick slipping father and father away from her while she scrambled around the garage, as useless and panicked as a lab rat running a maze with no reward.

Mom or Summer! They might know what to do - and Morty made a half aborted lurch towards the door to the house before she remembered – the house would be empty. Mom was taking a test, Summer was _fuck_ knows where, 911 wouldn’t know what to do with someone as… augmented as he was, and even though she pulled out her phone - her trembling, bloody fingers smearing over the dark touchscreen uselessly - she knew there was no one she could call who could help her now.

She was running out of time – uselessly dithering between ideas. _This_ was why she needed Rick, if their positions were reversed, he’d be keeping her together, keeping her _alive_ – he was probably the only one in this goddamn galaxy who _could_ save someone who’d been shot in the head - _she_ was the one who was supposed to take that bullet and he fucked it all up!

A fatalistic kind of surety stole over Morty – just for half a second, just for long enough for her to realize, for her to _know_ …

What she needed was _a Rick_. And she knew just where to find one.

Her hands were shaking and weak but it was easy to rip the topaz stone from around her wrist and drop it on the floor beside Rick’s body. With a quivering gasp, she braced herself against the shelf and put all her weight on her damaged leg, the pain a distant spike of lightning compared to the syrup-thick fear making it hard to breathe.

She raised her good leg and stomped down hard on the glittering gem, a silent plea to the universe wordlessly taking shape in her head.

The gem cracked underfoot and she stumbled back, her bad leg unable to hold her up any longer, and she crumpled against Rick’s side leaning back to make room for the green spiral that whooshed into existence above the broken topaz, a portal to the one place in all the multiverse Morty had left to turn to for help.

‘ _Rick_ ,’ Morty begged silently in her head, wrapping her arms around Rick’s torso and dragging him as best she could towards her last hope, huffing a desperate breath against his coarse hair and crying out when she used her damaged, bloody leg to leverage them through the portal. ‘ _Please_.’

The world was spinning again, they were leaving a trail of blood across the garage floor and she had no idea how much was hers and how much was Rick’s. She was almost there – she couldn’t raise herself off her knees, and her leg was as much dead weight as Rick was. But eventually they were all the way through the swirl of green, Rick’s limp feet dragged out the other side.

Morty – her vision tunneling, the world narrowing to Rick’s bloody hands and his slack face and the ice-blue eye locked on the middle distance - swung her head around and found another set of ice-blue eyes and a slightly more manicured unibrow rising above them in disbelief.

“ _Ric_ ,” Morty rasped, more sob than statement. “ _Please_.”

And then the tunnel narrowed to black, the last sensation Morty registered the feel of Rick’s weight on top of her before she slipped back into empty space.


	22. Chapter Twenty-Two

“Morty,” a rough female voice jerked Morty out of unconsciousness like someone had sunk a line into the blackness behind her eyes and reeled her in. “ _Morty_.”

Morty bolted upright her eyes open but unseeing as she blinked away the dark still clinging around the edges.

The room was bright – so bright she had to squint her eyes closed against the light – a hand automatically raising to shield her eyes. There was a familiar smell – vodka and hot metal and ozone – but it was overlaid with something almost floral like perfume that threw off the comforting mix in a strange, foreign way.

“ _Rick_!” Morty breathed, her recent memories crashing back into her all in a rush, his name a ragged pant. Desperately she scanned the bright and unfamiliar room for any sign of him and she flinched in half-remembered surprise upon finding instead someone who looked _very_ much like Rick, but _not quite_.

Ric – the kind, open-minded, female Rick who had shown her around the Palisade and offered her a different life more than half a year ago – was sitting cross legged beside Morty, her chin resting on a fist, her elbow braced against her knee. The frown on the older woman’s face was… _pleased_ wasn’t quite the right word, but it was somewhere between that and vaguely annoyed.

“Hey, Mo- _ooough-_ rty,” she deadpanned, her eyebrow an unimpressed flat line while she dug a flask out of the breast pocket of her lab coat and tilted it to her lips. “You know, when I gave you that portable-portal, this wasn’t exactly the use I had in mind.”

Morty clenched her fists, too aware of how bare her wrist already felt without the bracelet. “You said – I thought it was for emergencies…” Morty trailed off, rubbing at her eyes and taking another sweeping scan of the room. Where was Rick? She had to find him – had to make sure he was okay - but he wasn’t lying in bed next to her magically healed like she had half-hoped he would be.

There was a closed door at the opposite end of the room and it drew her attention like a magnet.

“I meant emergencies for _you_. Though admittedly, you were in _pretty bad shape_.”

Yeah, Morty dimly remembered that. The heart-pounding, winded feeling of bleeding out. The blinding pain of her leg. Rick’s dead weight ( _don’t call it that_ ) on top of her.

Speaking of which, the lack of said man was really starting to concern her and Morty started trying to climb out of bed but the look Ric cocked her froze her in her tracks. “But I don’t remember including a plu- _uuugh-_ s one, Morty.”

Morthy’s breathing started to stutter, panic refilling the empty space it had only so recently vacated.

“Is he –”

“Ugh –” Ric rolled her eyes, interrupting Morty before she took another two deep sips from her flask. “I fixed your leg. No- _ooough-_ t that you noticed.”

Morty’s mouth dropped open in a gape when she glanced down and realized belatedly that the horrible agony had, in fact, completely disappeared. _So had her pants_. Then again, last she’d seen them, the one leg had been shredded to almost nothing and they’d been completely drenched with blood. And her leg – which had been a horrifying mess of red and darker red and _meat_ \- was completely unmarked; nothing so much as a scar left to prove she’d very nearly been an alien monster’s afternoon snack.

“ _Oh wow_ ,” Morty exhaled, flexing her leg and running her fingers over the smooth skin. “Th – thanks.” She glanced up in time to see Ric cut her eyes up from Morty’s bare leg, her gaze intent and cutting, thin lines of crystal-clear blue around blown-out black pupils.

The look was too intense to bear so Morty let her attention drift back down to her body. She was laid out on a huge bed wearing a simple teal t-shirt that was oversized enough to qualify as a dress. Her body - which had been covered in blood when last she was awake - was clean, tan skin unblemished by gore.

She was in Ric’s bedroom - that much was obvious now she was more awake - laying in the bed that she’d occasionally pictured herself in during her darkest moments locked away in the bunker. The room was cluttered and messy and the floor was littered with empty bottles and cans, just like Rick’s, but the bright sunlight streaming in made everything about as different from his tiny, dim bedroom as she could possibly imagine.

Morty turned her head towards the light to discover one wall was nothing but window, a high view of a park blooming green and orange and pink under the curved glass dome shielding the Palisade from the stars. The artificial sunlight put the time somewhere around late evening, the dappled rays of light pouring through the room tinted golden with sunset.

“I gave you a transfusion,” Ric’s voice cut Morty out of her uneven thinking, and Ric held out her arm to show Morty the place where she’d tapped a cotton ball over her own vein. For some reason, the sight made Morty’s eyes swim with tears. “You were soaked with blood all the way down to your underwear so I cleaned you up, too. Morty, wha- _aaaugh-_ t the hell got you?”

“The – uh – the Galmorfian Terror?” Morty admitted on an up tilt, hastily swiping at her eyes. God, she really was a fucking disaster – she owed Ric her _life_. And even though Ric had patched her up and cleaned all the gore away and laid her out to rest on her own bed, Morty hadn’t thought of anyone besides Rick since she woke up. She _still_ couldn’t help her thoughts from tracking back to him, worrying over him, pleading silently to the unrelenting universe that he was okay.

“ _Shi-_ uuugh- _t_ ,” Ric cursed, sounding impressed. “Those are nasty little fuckers.” With a heavy sigh, Ric leaned forward and swiped the tears off Morty’s cheek with gentle surety. “But last I checked, they couldn’t shoot people in the face. They don’t have the right thumbs for that - not in this dimension at least.”

Morty paled, the reminder of those bloody circuits sparking in the gaping hole of Rick’s empty eye socket too vivid and horrifying to suppress. “N – no. That was –” Morty swallowed heavily, “- we ran into some Feds.”

Ric hummed in acknowledgment and Morty strained to guess what that carefully neutral face meant on someone so similar to Rick but utterly different. What wasn’t Ric telling her? Was Rick dead and she was trying to break the news slowly? Had she shoved him back through the portal to die on his own, face-down on the garage floor? Had he already woken up and left her here because she proved herself a failure as a human shield?

It wasn’t until Ric braced a hand on her shoulder and urged, “He’s _fine_ , Morty, calm the fuck down,” that Morty realized she had started to hyperventilating.

“He – he is?” she breathed, her heart lodged somewhere in her throat.

“Yeah, I fixed him up too. Lucky he had so much hardware in his head or that laser blast might have melted his brain.” Ric sighed, a cruel, wistful sound. “I guess I can’t always be so lucky.”

Morty clung to Ric’s hand, squeezing her thin, calloused fingers in her palm hard enough to make Ric chuckle. “So he’s – he’s not –”

Ric’s cocky smirk didn’t quite reach her eyes. “He’s still out cold but he’ll wake up once the new tech I installed boots up. That piece of shit got a free upgrade – not that he’ll know how to appreciate it.”

Morty sank back onto the pillow, a shuddering sigh blowing out between her parted lips.

She knew it, even in her panicked state – she _knew_ it was a lot to ask of Ric, a lot to _literally_ drop in her lap, Morty’s last desperate plea pretty much adding up to, ‘ _please save this man that you hate_ ’ - but against all odds, Ric had done it.

Thank _fucking_ christ, she’d done it.

If it had been up to Rick to save his female doppelganger… Morty wasn’t so sure he’d return the favor, and a familiar if hateful spike of something stabbed Morty in her conscience, but she couldn’t let herself dwell on that right now. She could do that later when she was alone with her thoughts, trying to fall asleep to the sound of Rick’s snoring or taking a long shower by herself. She had plenty of time later to listen on that niggling constant whisper of ‘ _you probably should’ve picked Ric_ ’ wearing at the deep tears in her self-esteem, but that could come after the shine of Rick being brought back - seemingly from the brink of death - wore off.

At the moment it was hard to imagine that it ever would.

“Now, I think there’s something the two of us need to discuss, _Mooooorty_ ,” Ric sing-songed, breaking Morty out of her downward spiral of self-hatred and dragging her back to the present.

“O – oh?”

Ric slid open the drawer of her nightstand and tossed something metal and round onto the bedspread between them. It took Morty longer than it should have to realize it was _the collar_ , and one of her hands jerked up in surprise only to sink through empty space to the bare skin around her neck.

She hadn’t even noticed it was missing.

Her hand dragged down lower to fist the star pendant at her neck, _irrationally_ grateful it was still there.

“You got anything to say about that?” Ric asked, her eyes piercing as she watched Morty’s hand dither in the vicinity of her neck.

And what the fuck _could_ Morty say that wouldn’t be profoundly embarrassing or incriminate Rick to someone with way too much power over him at the moment?

“I –” she decided to try to start with but it seemed that Ric’s question had been rhetorical cause she blurted over her;

“A _shock collar_ , Morty?” Morty could _feel_ her cheeks heating up, all that borrowed blood rushing to turn her face red - but she sucked her lips in between her teeth and stared back as steadfastly as she could. “Are you – _fuck_ – is that something you’re _into_ or was that _his_ idea.”

“M – maybe both…”

Ric breathed out hard through her nostrils, a frustrated sigh. “You’re _lying to me_ , Morty.”

“I – I don’t _know,_ okay. I didn’t – I don’t _hate it_ , I guess.” The lack of confidence in her voice was really not doing her any favors and Ric bracketed her shoulders in her palms, turning her to face her head on. The gesture reminded Morty so much of her-Rick that it made her chest ache.

“ _Morty_.”

“ _I don’t_ hate it,” Morty reasserted, and this time her voice sounded a little steadier. “I – I can handle it.” And she could. She could handle _anything_ Rick threw at her; that was her fucking job.

“You don’t have to – _Morty_ , you shouldn’t have to ‘ _handle_ ’ anything. You –” Ric trailed off, scowling. “You _deserve_ something better, Morty.”

“No I don’t,” Morty promised, and there was no waver in the cadence of her voice.

Ric shook her head, almost _pityingly_ and bit out, “Oh yeah? _Why not_?” And she sounded more dangerous – more like Morty’s-Rick – than she ever had before.

“Because I’m not – I’m not _good_ Ric, not the way you think I am. Not the way the other Morties here are.” Ric looked distinctly unimpressed and Morty scrabbled to find the words to explain herself. “I’m – I’m messed up and I’ve done a bunch of shitty things and some of it _I don’t even feel bad about_.”

“Welcome to the fucking club, Morty,” Rick insisted, giving Morty’s shoulders a pointed shake. “ _None_ of us are good people – there’s no such fucking thing! Even _Ghandi_ was racist and sexist and a fucking pedophile! But that doesn’t mean you should be _collared_ , Morty - that doesn’t mean you don’t _deserve_ to be treated better.”

Ric’s chest was heaving with righteous indignation and Morty didn’t quite miss the way her eyes flashed briefly down to Morty’s lips.

And for no reason at all, the obvious explanation of why Morty tolerated Rick’s bullshit hit her over the head like a sledgehammer.

“I – I like it, okay? Rick – my Rick – he _gets_ me. He’s the only who looks _at_ me instead of _through_ me.”

“No shit, Morty, you think that’s a fucking accident? He _groomed_ you, Morty!” Morty let out a long shuddering breath and Ric steamrollered on, that electric stare boring into Morty like liquid fury. “Let me guess: You don’t have any friends at school. You don’t get along with your mom and I bet your dad and Summer are mostly absent by now – _in fact_ ,” she plowed on, a victorious glint in her eyes at Morty’s accidental flinch, “- I bet he split your parents up. Jerry _is_ out of the picture now, isn’t he? It’d be easier for _him_ that way. And if you’ve tried to date someone your own age, he’s interfered, _hasn’t he Morty_?”

Morty frowned and swallowed, her eyes glued on her own fist, tangled up in Ric’s duvet.

“He’s been isolating you and this –” Ric nudged the collar angrily where it dipped the covers in front of Morty’s crossed legs, “- is just another part of that.”

“I know,” Morty breathed quietly into her own lap, too ashamed to raise her eyes to Ric. “ _I know that, Ric._ I’ve known the whole time.”

Morty felt her brow furrow into a frown. She hated a lot of what Rick made her put up with - the bunker, the forced silence, the way he twisted himself around her until she lost track of where he ended and she began – but the sick parts of Morty that hated _herself_ more than she hated him needed that punishment because at least it meant he felt _something_ for her. At least _someone_ did.

And she could never ignore that traitorous spiral of heat that was always lurking in her stomach, pushing at her insides and reminding her that she didn’t _entirely_ hate those things. That some of them – some of the time – made her feel more alive and in her body than anything else in her life.

“And it’s super fucked up, _I know_ , Ric – but –” Morty sighed and huffed out a noise that was almost a laugh, dragging her eyes up to Ric who was boring into her with such unexpected sincerity Morty’s throat threatened to close up. “Ric, I think _he’s_ been isolated too, ever since he started dimension hoping, or – or maybe even before that – maybe his whole life.”

There was something in the exaggerated scowl and slightly distant look to Ric’s eyes that told Morty she hadn’t been wrong. It was something a lot of Ricks felt, probably – maybe something _everyone_ felt.

Because Morty’d had a hard time making friends _her whole life_. And her parents had never been particularly attentive. And she’d been alone _all the fucking time_ well before Rick crashed into her life and started pushing her boundaries and gave her a super convenient excuse to not fit in.

At least now she wasn’t nearly as lonely.

“Being stupid’s easy.” Morty did laugh then, a self-deprecating sound that tented Ric’s unibrow. “It’s being smart that’s hard.”

Morty could _see_ the truth of that statement reflected in Ric’s blown-out eyes.

“You said it yourself. _Nobody’s_ a good person _._ A – and Rick’s just about as far from that as possible anyways, but what we’ve got – it works for us. So don’t tell me what I _deserve_. That’s just as bullshit as… wait, what time is it?”

A thought had just caught up to Morty, something that had been niggling at the back of her brain when she realized the sun outside Ric’s bedroom was setting, and Ric glared at Morty for changing the subject.

“No wait, what time is it in the Andromeda Galaxy – what time is it on Hyperion?”

Ric, her brow bunched up in a frown, reluctantly consulted her watch. “A little after eight.”

“ _Oh no_ , mom! She’s – she’s probably waiting for us – _shit_ ,” Morty rolled, trying to crawl her way to the edge of Ric’s way-too-big bed but Ric wrapped a hand around Morty’s bicep in a very familiar grip.

“Calm down, Morty, I’m sure she’s fine.”

“No she’s – _jeez -_ her test probably got out hours ago!” Morty gripped a fistful of her hair and tugged. Oh man, mom was gonna be _pissed_ and she’d direct all that negative energy right at Morty who totally earned it because if she hadn’t insisted that she needed to see dad – fuck, today just kept turning into shit show after shit show.

“Her test?” Ric repeated, voice stern.

“She’s on Hyperion in U-694 taking an entrance exam. We left the ship in the middle of town – we were supposed to pick her up and drive her back _hours_ ago.”

Ric rolled her eyes. “ _Okay, okay_ , Morty. I’ll go find her and shoot her a portal home.”

Ric let go of Morty’s arm and stood up, spinning the dial on her portal gun while Morty rolled to her feet, grateful they could both carry her weight again without any searing pain.

“W – what about Rick? Where is he?” She did her best to sound commanding, to sound _firm_ , but she couldn’t quite keep the pleading edge out of her tone.

Ric sighed and kneaded her temples, glaring at Morty up her brow before she shook her head and twisted the bedroom door knob, swinging the door wide into the kitchen/workspace Morty had seen before – the one where Ric had whipped up the portal-in-a-gemstone bracelet and slid it over her wrist with a too-genuine worry frown wrinkling her forehead.

And there was Rick, spread out across a heavy metal work table in the center of the room, a tray of bloody instruments at his side, a poseable lamp hovering above him and crowning his lax face with light.

Relief flooded Morty like a ten-story tidal wave and she let herself be swept away with it. She staggered towards him, reaching for his hand and stopping short when she realized the appendage was robotic still, and flecked with dried blood. Only then did she realize he’d been strapped down to the table with restraints, thick metal looped around his wrists and his ankles, one wider band stretching over his chest.

“Why did you –”

“- I’m not letting this asshole loose in my house, Morty. And I didn’t want him waking up mid surgery and trying to blo- _ooough-_ w my fucking brains out.” She tossed Morty the collar, the metal thick and heavy. “Plus the bastard has earned _way_ worse.”

Morty felt her cheeks flush again but didn’t let her eyes drop to the floor because Ric was scraping her gaze over her head to toe like she was trying to find a crack to pick at. After a tense thirty second stare off, Ric grumbled a bit to herself and shook her head.

“Anyways, wa- _aaaugh-_ it here. I’ll be back.”

She turned away, a disgruntled frown curling down her lips and Morty rushed to stammer, “Th – thanks Ric…” Ric’s face relaxed, the look she cast over her shoulder almost fond before she hardened her eyes with a cocky smirk.

With a swirl of green and the whoosh of a white coat, Ric was gone, disappearing through a portal and leaving Morty alone in her cluttered apartment with a comatose Rick.

From Morty’s position, she could only make out the left half of Rick’s face, his chin tilted slightly away from her, his face still splattered with blood and the darker blue muck that must have been from the Galmorfian Terrors. He was shirtless, his lab coat and sweater crumpled in a gory pile on the floor Morty carefully stepped over on her lap around the table.

She didn’t realize she was holding her breath until it all came gushing out of her at the sight of Rick’s eye socket. It was no longer empty and sparking – which was definitely an improvement - but the dim white orb fixed in place was eerie. The skin around the artificial eye had been burnt down to a metal skull, the eyelids missing completely. The edge of a cheekbone and the curved line of his brow (including the last inch of his unibrow) peeled away to reveal burnished silver that disappeared under pallid skin.

Yet against she found herself wondering how much of him was metal. How many parts had he needed to replace over the years when there was no one to watch his back?

She covered his metal fingers with her flesh ones – _absurdly_ grateful for whatever accident took his eye because it had just inadvertently saved his life.

Her hands were shaking and she had to manually uncurl her fingers from around the hard edge of the collar, dropping it next to Rick’s hip. It looked strangely dead – which was a stupid thing to think about a hunk of metal – and Morty couldn’t figure out why until she realized the small lights were no longer blinking. She’d never seen them dark before, had grown too used to seeing them flicker mockingly at her whenever she looked in the mirror, and without them, the band looked colder and more sterile than ever before.

Next to Rick – his one lidless eye completely vacant – they made quite the pair.

After a few minutes that Morty lost to concentrating on her suddenly raged breathing, she brushed a finger along Rick’s hairline, smoothing out the strands that had fallen out of their usual disarray. Without making the active decision to do so, her touch trailed down to his neck where she pressed two fingertips to his pulse point, a sigh escaping her like it had been punched out of her gut.

His heart was beating steady and strong, just like it always did, and the tears that had been blurring her vision finally overflowed and leaked down her cheeks in a steady stream.

Rick was _alive_. Against all fucking odds, _Rick was_ _alive_.

Morty sniffled, wiping her nose on her arm, trying to keep herself from straight up sobbing but it was hard, especially when she rested her fingers on his bare chest and felt how icy-cold his skin was, the sensation startling a wet cry from her mouth.

But Rick was always cold, she reminded herself before she could get hysterical. His skin was always cool to the touch, his feet ice where they tangled with hers under the covers, and his fingers left goosebumps on her skin when he snuck them under her shirt. She wondered dimly if that had anything to do with the metal she now knew lay below his flesh – dad’s voice echoed in the back of her mind, constant jeers of calling Rick ‘ _cold blooded_ ’ worming up from some forgotten place - but Morty only barely resisted the urge to plaster herself across his chest like a human blanket because his metal fingers twitched minutely in her hand.

Morty bolted to attention, wiping at her cheeks again and peering into his face, waiting for further signs of life. When – of all things – a low hum like a computer starting up reverberated from his exposed metal skull, Morty stared in fascination as the artificial eyeball rolled in its socket, spinning around until a familiar ice-y blue pupil centered itself on the orb. The pupil dilated and contracted in rapid succession, the gaze still empty, until it finished its calibration.

Right when Morty was thinking she should start calling his name, Rick shifted, his brow (or what was left of it) scrunching up and he groaned – a long, pained sound like he was struggling to shove off a hangover. Morty let a breathy laugh burble out of her uninhibited too loud in the sunset-red painted quiet.

He squinted his real eye open – his mechanical one swiveling to match it perfectly - and glared at her briefly before he did a quick, calculative sweep of the room.

“Morty,” he rasped, his voice especially rough. “Where the fuck are we?”

“Ric’s apartment,” she breathed immediately, his metal fingers tightening on hers while he squinted around at the room again. She could practically hear the question ‘ _which Rick_ ’ circling around the whites of his eyes as he took in the vibrant artificial sky outside the window and the glass bubble warding off the stars. She quickly added, “On - on the Palisade,” before she burst from anxiety.

_That_ registered to him, his whole body jerking once in a lurch that would have sent him halfway across the room if he wasn’t bolted to the table. Morty’s self-preservation instincts insisted she drop his hand and back up a step before she had a chance to weigh the intelligence of visibly cringing away from him.

“ _Morty_. Why the _fuck_ are we on the Palisade?” He clenched his fists and gave one hard tug at the restraints on his wrists. “And _why the fuck_ am I _TIED DOWN_?!”

Okay, well, on the bright side, he probably wasn’t near death anymore if he could shout that loud.

“You got shot,” she reminded him, watching his arms strain against the manacles but the cuffs wouldn’t budge. The tabletop shuddered, slightly, but Morty could clearly see where the legs had been soldered to the floor with brackets. Rick raised his shoulders as high off the table as he could with the band across his chest and surveyed his body and the restraints keeping him pinned.

“ _Get me off of this thing_ ,” he commanded, and Morty stumbled towards him, checking the bands for a button or a release, crouching down and surveying the underside of the table where all she discovered was smooth, unbroken metal.

“I – I don’t know how, Rick!” she admitted sheepishly, her fingers scrabbling over the manacle around his ankle, tugging uselessly against the bond. “Ric – she didn’t tell me how to unlock you but she’s – she’ll be right back, I think. She went to go get mom –”

“She _what_ , Morty?” he spit, electric gaze circling back to her ferociously. And _jeez_ , even with the way he looked like some kind of roughed up Terminator, his eyes uneven as they pegged her with death beams, she could only be grateful – so _painfully_ grateful – that they were focused and full of sparks and fire instead of foggy and out of focus, staring unseeingly through the garage ceiling. Or that’s what she _thought_ she felt until his real eye narrowed and his contracted pupils skittered to the very bare place on her neck, a dangerous snarl twisting his face.

“It’s _late_ Rick, I didn’t –” Rick tilted his hips and the shift pushed the collar off the edge of the table, the metallic thud giving Rick pause for three seconds as he strained (without success) to see what had fallen. When Morty made no move except to suck her lower lip between her teeth, he jammed his pinned hands into his pants pocket only to groan in frustration, no doubt finding them empty - Morty didn’t think Ric was stupid enough to leave anything he could use against her within reaching distance.

To aware he’d turned his uneven glare back on her, she rushed to explain, “Mom was probably waiting for us and I thought – I was kind of worried about her so Ric went to pick her up – so you could have a chance to finish healing or whatever…”

She was rambling and stammering – her cool completely unraveling under Rick’s wild-animal-in-a-cage fury.

“Morty, find my lab coat. Where’s my portal gun? How – how _the fuck_ did we even get here?”

Morty tried _hard_ to resist the urge to cover the empty space on her wrist where her bracelet used to hang but her hand twitched and Rick’s glare cut through her like a scalpel, dissecting her thoughts. His eyes dropped to her wrist and he frowned.

“I – I – I took us here,” she stammered, knowing and _hating_ that her face was scrunching up in guilt. “With your portal gun…” she cringed. Lying to Rick was _impossible_. “I – I think I dropped it in the garage…”

“You fucking liar. You wouldn’t know the dimensional number. Unless –” His eyes dipped again to her missing bracelet and he fumed, his brow lowering dangerously. “- _Moooorty_ , unless you had a little _secret_ dangling on your wrist all this time, you _fucking snake_.”

“Rick just – just calm down, okay.”

“What? Were you holding out for the perfect time to bail on me, Morty, is that it? Were you fucking _spying on me_ , Morty?! _For her_?!”

“Rick, _no_ ,” she pleaded, _hating_ how whiney her voice sounded.

“ _No one_ fucks with me, Morty. _Not even you_.”

“Rick, _what? I wouldn’t_ –”

“And if you think you can get away from me, _think again_ ,” he spat, electric eyes lighting sparks across her skin, “because there’s _no way_ this plays out where I don’t hunt you down and drag you back.”

“ _Oh._ ” The gasp was startled out of her unbidden because… _whoa._

What the fuck was wrong with her that _that_ made all those tangled vines in her stomach lurch, the feeling equal parts terrified and aroused – and jeez, couldn’t her body behave itself for _three fucking minutes_. But considering Rick’s dilated pupils and heaving chest, she thought he might be working himself up just as much as she was.

“Rick,” she started again, struggling to keep her voice from wavering. “It’s not – it isn’t like that. You almost _died_.”

“Yeah? Well I’d _rather_ be dead than let that _psycho bitch_ tamper with my fucking hardware.”

“ _Don’t say that_ ,” Morty whispered quietly, the words nearly punched out of her chest.

“ _Why_ , Morty? _Fuck_ , don’t tell me –” he blinked his real eye shut hard once – twice – the artificial orb rolling in its socket. It flickered briefly between his red targeting system and something eerie green and glowing before it returned to his normal looking blue iris, his breath coming faster and angrier. “She already fucking did, _that BITCH_.”

“Rick, _don’t_ -” but he was already straining against the metal bonds again, the table actually _creaking_ with the force of his determination.

“Is that why my brain feels like fucking soup? Cause she messed around with my shit?”

“You idiot – you’re lucky you’ve got a brain at all, Rick! _You were shot IN THE FUCKING HEAD_!”

And maybe her tone was all wrong – too loud and shrill for her to be speaking with someone who probably had brain damage – but the last couple hours of pent up fear and panic and shock burst out of her like a volcano erupting, apparently inspiring a whole new wave of hard, ugly tears.

“You – you fucking _asshole_! You got shot _in the head!_ I – I thought _for sure_ you were… _why the_ fuck _would you do that, Rick_?! He was aiming at _me_!”

And okay, so maybe she was having a meltdown, and maybe Rick was looking at her wide eyed and somewhat abashed, but _so what_? Rick had almost _died_. She had seen stuff _inside of his head_ – the kind of stuff that was supposed to _stay_ inside his head - and she hadn’t realized until that exact moment, sobbing angry, frightened tears, that he could have woken up a fucking vegetable, he could have woken up no more intelligent that her fucking dad was now, he could have _not woken up_ _at all_ – and all she could still think about was how it should have been _her_ taking that fucking laser blast to the face.

“ _Morty_ …” he rasped softly, his body relaxing against his bonds, turning his head so he could catch her eyes.

“No, Rick, _don’t_. I’m – I’m –” she couldn’t find the words – couldn’t explain to him or to herself or to Ric just how _useless_ she’d felt scrambling around with no way to save Rick but to beg for help from someone else. Or how terrifying the long stretch of her life _without him_ had seemed, the path ahead of her barred by a thick wall of fog. Or how she would be cursed to spend the rest of her ( _unbearably normal_ ) life trying to understand why he would take a laser blast meant for her when _he_ was the valuable one and _didn’t he fucking know that_?!

A faint, soft touch at her hip startled her into opening her eyes. Rick’s metal hand was stretched away from its restraint, just the barest edge of his fingertips able to reach her. She slowly leaned forward, rested her hip against the edge of the table, and he fisted a handful of her borrowed t-shirt.

For a while Rick only glared at her, Morty daring to steal peeks at his frustrated frown between her hands as she scrubbed at the tears that didn’t seem to want to stop. Eventually he breathed out a long, rasping exhale and Morty braced herself for a verbal reaming.

But his voice was quiet when he bit out, “You aren’t a _cancer_ , Morty, you fucking drama queen,” gently, his brow scrunched up like he hated that he’d said the words but Morty was utterly lost. Her face must have reflected those thoughts because he elaborated, “That’s what you told me. Earlier. But you aren’t.” His words came out stilted and heavy, like he was having a hard time making them leave his mouth, and she blinked and sniffled, distantly remembering the statement she’d thrown at him earlier like she’d spoken them years ago instead of just a few hours prior.

( _“Everything is my fault. I’m a fucking_ cancer _, Rick.”_ )

Had he been thinking about that all along?

“I – yes I am,” she stammered, utterly sure of that fact and baffled as to why he would fight her on it.

“ _No you fucking_ – I wouldn’t step in front of a gun for fucking _cancer,_ Morty.”

“Then – then _why_?”

Rick glared at her, his walls up so high she was pushed a thousand miles away. His eyes were steely and cold and furious but deeper than that, in the black-hole depths of his pupils, she could just make out a sliver of fear reflected back at her – a fear he hated and guarded and hid so well she’d barely ever seen a glimmer of it before.

And like the snap of a rubber band against her forehead, she realized she’d been so blinded by the way she _thought_ things were, she never saw them for what they were.

Her mind flashed back to that day she’d been shot - the day she took that laser blast to the gut for Rick - the day she pressed a hand to her stomach and pulled it away covered in red and thought, ‘ _huh, so this is it?_ ”

Her head tilted back on her shoulders and she stared blankly through the prismatic clouds drifting across a perfectly clear pink sky. It was so bright - so sunny her eyes hurt just for looking. But it was beautiful. So beautiful she could cry.

On some other plane of existence, Morty was dimly aware that her trigger finger had relaxed and Rick’s voice was shouting angry demands at her back, gunfire still stirring the air around her and blowing up chucks of turf at her feet, but everything sounded far away and unimportant.

She fell in slow motion, her legs suddenly offline even as her brain screamed ‘ _run, duck, hide, stay alive!_ ’ But instead of doing anything useful, her knees buckled underneath her and the rocky blue gravel rushed up to meet her face.

She never hit the ground.

“ _No, Morty!_ ” Rick had screamed, his voice raw and frantic, loud and desperate and unhinged. She’d never heard his voice like that before. _Terrified_. And her eyes, which had been sliding shut as darkness crept up around the corners, popped open at Rick’s uncharacteristic, _gut-wrenching_ shout.

How had she forgotten that shout? It echoed through her memories all the way down to her bones and they _trembled_ at the hopeless sound.

She had no idea how Rick single-handedly managed to take out the rest of the aliens. She’d felt a burst of heat, the world flashing a brilliant green, and the softer warmth of Rick’s body – since when had Rick felt _warm? -_ but focusing on anything beside the visible pulse pounding under the thin skin of Rick’s throat meant thinking about the pain and that was unbearable. Then there was a new kind of agony, her stomach burning and tearing like she was shot all over again, and then the brief reprieve of nothingness.

When she came back to, Rick’s pale, drawn face hovered just out of focus. He was slapping her - slapping her hard enough that her face was jerking with the motion - but she couldn’t feel the sting of it on her cheek, not over the burning fist clenched around the place her stomach used to be. She was afraid to look down, afraid to see her intestines spilling out of her like the filling of a piñata - or maybe she’d only find a perfect, horrible circle cut out of her like a cartoon character.

She made her fat, dry lips shape something, some kind of grumble with no real intent, and Rick’s face left the focal point of her vision.

“You gotta stay with me, Morty,” he told her, and she got the impression that his head was bent over her lap, his body crammed in the space between the two front seats.

They were in space, in the ship, and when she tilted her head back, it was to watch a planet whiz by above them, the angle oddly vertigo inducing but also just _breathtakingly_ incredible. Jeez, she took the ship for granted. When was the last time she sat back and really appreciated the view?

At that moment, everything looked sharp and crisp and perfect, stars glittering spectacularly outside the glass dome like diamonds in the dark.

Even the pain in her stomach was fading to a soft fuzzed-out throbbing but her heart – her heart was pounding like she was running a marathon. Which was weird, she thought dimly, because slumped back in the fully reclined passenger seat, she couldn’t even lift up her hand and wipe the wetness off of Rick’s cheek.

She couldn’t get enough breath in her lungs but her mouth was open and panting quick, short breaths and that scared her – scared her so bad it made her whole body ache. She scrabbled for that dissociative distance she had so perfected the last few months – the one that kept her from dwelling too long on her absent father or her drunken mother or Rick’s far-too-dangerous smile – and focused on the view outside the window instead, the ship dodging and diving through the asteroid-littered rings of a violently purple planet glittering with ice.

If she had to die, doing it there in the ship with the galaxy flitting past in technicolor brilliance maybe wasn’t the worst way to go.

Rick jerked his head up to glare at her and she wondered if she had mumbled something of her thoughts aloud. “You don’t _get_ to die, _Morty_ ,” he snarled, and the smell of burning flesh and the copper tang of blood filtered distantly through her senses. “I’m your fucking _god_ and you don’t get to check out until I say so.”

And the gleam in those blue eyes had been so charged, so voltaic, so _alive_ , she had no choice but to obey, even as she slipped over the precipice into his dilated pupils and sank through time and space.

Those eyes were searing into her still, Rick strapped to the table and her hovering at his side, her arms wrapped around her middle in a half-formed memory of the hole that should have been there – the hole that should have _killed_ her.

And _jeez_ , she really was an idiot.

That frantic hug he’d crushed her into when she woke up in the hospital on Hyperion - the way he’d harassed and commanded and threatened every nurse, doctor, and orderly that came into the room - the way he’d pulled away after they returned home, scared to take her out on adventures, worried he’d hurt her, too apprehensive to _touch her._

But all those things – they were a symptom of a deeper fear, one Morty had never dared think because if she was wrong, that false hope would destroy her. And now, staring into his uneven eyes, she saw the perfect golden truth that some part of her had unknowingly clung to all this time.

_Rick was afraid of losing her_.

It took a lot to scare _Rick Sanchez_ , and she could hardly believe _she_ had that power.

Morty had no idea what her face was doing – she was too mixed up with feelings, too swept up in the rip-tide of Rick - but it must have looked bad because a tiny little glimmer of worry sparked and then sizzled down to nothing behind Rick’s hard mask of indifference, his fingers clenching tighter in her shirt.

“ _Rick –_ ”

Morty breathed out a deep gust, understanding dawning huge and unbearably beautiful in the pit of her stomach. She had been looking for it for so long but maybe it had been there the whole time, hidden under layer after layer of Rick’s hard shells. And he’d never say it – she knew him too well to expect that – but it _was_ true. _It was._

“ _You love me_.”

The words were impossible until they’d blossomed out of her mouth, a field of flowers glowing iridescent under a dark sky. The ghost of a warm breath against the back of her neck when he tugged her tighter against his chest and drifted off. A tiny cluster of _actual_ stars brought to life and captured just to hang around her neck.

A guarded, jaded look transformed Rick’s face into something feral and he glared at her like she’d grown another head. “Morty, _what the fuck_ –”

“ _You do_ ,” she insisted, seeing it clearly now that she had finally pulled back far enough to get the whole picture. Even that mean snarl showing off his pointed canines couldn’t hide the truth any longer. One of her hands raised to cover her mouth. “ _Oh my god_.”

“ _Morty_...” Rick growled, but the edge to his voice lacked heat and – _oh shit_ – his cheeks were just _the slightest_ shade closer to pink than his usual sallow paleness. _Holy mother of fuck_.

Morty laughed, the sound sudden and breathy and edged with tears, her smile so wide it hurt her cheeks. “No, I mean…” she laughed again, quietly to herself, watching Rick’s face struggle to stay fixed in a scowl, “…you show it in some _truly fucked up ways_ , obviously. But –” she had to pause to catch her breath because this was just _unreal_. “- _you love me_.”

All those holes, all those dark pits, all the places that used to feel so empty were suddenly overflowing and Morty didn’t know what to do with herself. Most of her impulses told her to throw herself on top of Rick and kiss him silly, cling to his hard chest and never let go. But she didn’t dare move lest she break the moment, didn’t blink for fear of missing a fraction of his ridiculous, barely contained expressions.

Because Rick was working his jaw like there was something stuck in his teeth and he was _stewing_ like he was pissed she’d been unexpectedly cleverer than he expected and if she was wrong about him loving her, _he would have told her so by now_.

She was so irrationally endeared she laid a hand down on the table next to his neck and leaned over him, her smile a million watts too bright.

“Don’t let it go to your head,” he grit out from between his clenched teeth and Morty dissolved into a fresh wave of happy tears and slightly hysterical laughter, ducking her head down to press her forehead briefly against Rick’s chest.

“ _Jeez_ ,” she sighed between breathy, wet chuckles, “And you think _I’m_ the drama queen.”

“I’m serious, Morty,” he warned, something precious and vulnerable stealing peeks from behind the mask he’d spent so long hiding behind. She squared her shoulders, determined to be worthy of the fragile vine of emotion he had allowed to grow for her, the gravity of him opening himself up – of the way he hadn’t lied about it or obfuscated the truth or eviscerated his feelings at the first sign of being found out – wasn’t lost on her, and the too-happy smile threatening to split her face melted into something softer and warmer as her heart flooded with adoration for the emotionally under-developed man spread out in front of her.

“I know, Rick. You’ve – you’ve got issues –” she admitted, realizing too late that maybe that was harsher than she should have been but Rick was already speaking over her.

“Just figuring that out now?” He was back to sarcasm and maybe that wasn’t a great sign, but there were things she had to lay out – things he had to _know_ – and it was always easiest to force him to listen to her when he was incapable of making an escape. She’d have to thank Ric for giving her that edge for the _second_ time, vaguely wondering whether her and Rick would _ever_ have this sort of discussion without her having to tie him down or lock him up first.

She continued on like he hadn’t interrupted, “- and you’ve - you’ve gotta cool it a little on the controlling stuff, okay, I get it –”

Her foot nudged at the collar on the ground and he hissed, “ _Don’t act like you don’t like it_.”

Morty leveled him a look but there was more heat in her cheeks than in her stare. “- and - and it’s not my job to fix you or whatever –”

“As if you could.”

She raised one eyebrow and met his glare head on.

“But I’m not going anywhere, Rick. You’ve gotta know that by now.” His glower was flat and heavy, his chest rising and falling so stiffly that Morty was sure he was counting his breaths. “What - Rick, _I love you_. And we’re so wrapped up in each other’s shit, _what the fuck would I do without you?_ ”

His eyes narrowed and scanned the room again, jumping to the window letting in the last of the pink rays of sunset, to the collection of similar-but-slightly-different inventions lining the shelf on the other end of the room, and finally to Morty’s face.

His fist tightened in her shirt. When he finally bit out, “I’m sure _Ric_ could find something to keep you occupied,” she could tell from the angry furrow of his brow it had come out sounding younger and more vulnerable than he’d meant it to.

“Ric –” Morty had to swallow down a vaguely giddy laugh, her heart uncomfortably full. “- Ric isn’t _you_. Do you really - if I wanted to swap out Ricks, I could’ve done it a million times by now.” She glanced at her bare wrist, thinking of the stone that used to dangle there. “I coulda done it when you locked me in the bunker for a month and a half. I coulda done it when you put a shock collar on me and sent me to school. I coulda done it when I found out you erased all my dad’s memories and turned him into a moron.”

And she _had_ thought about it – every single one of those times. _Jeez_ how she’d thought about it. But something about Rick always dragged her right back under his arm where she fit just too damn easily.

“He was _always_ a moron, Morty,” Rick breathed, his eyes bright as they darted between both of hers. “I _barely_ did anything there.”

She tried to glare at him but she utterly lacked the feelings to make it sincere. “ _My point is_ : stop pushing me away. I know you aren’t gonna just be – like - _sane_ overnight.” Rick rolled his eyes and Morty rushed to amend, “And I don’t _want_ you to be sane. I don’t want you to _change._ I _love_ you – _all_ of you. Even the psychotic parts, apparently.” Rick was staring at her, what was left of his eyebrow completely flat, and she felt the weight of his gaze all the way down to her soul. “I - I just want…”

Morty trailed off, no idea how that sentence was supposed to end. What _did_ she want? Jeez… she’d never asked herself that before.

She _liked_ all the fucked up stuff about Rick that she probably wasn’t supposed to but she had a messed up streak that ran perfectly parallel to his. She liked that he was a maniac, that he was almost completely unpredictable and mild-to-moderately-to- _sometimes-completely_ insane. She liked the way he treated her like her owned her because _he did_ \- she _wanted_ him to, there was no way else she’d rather live. She even liked the fucked up things he did to her; couldn’t honestly say she hated the collar or the bunker because they tied them together and functioned as a fucked up proof that he felt _something_ for her but didn’t know how to express it.

Then the words slotted into her mouth like they had lived there all along, tangled up in all those vines, just waiting to be said.

“I want you to _trust_ me.”

Whatever Rick had been expecting, his face flickered for a just a second in faint surprise before he scrunched up his brow in a disgruntled scowl. But even the deep V of his unibrow couldn’t disguise the way his eyes softened, dragging across her features like he was trying to find the lie.

After a long pause, he slowly speculated, “You think I regularly _arm_ someone I don’t trust?”

Morty swallowed. “I meant with your heart.”

“Ugh, _gross_.” Yup, that’s about what she expected.

“Jeez, I –” she sighed, running the back of her wrist against her forehead before settling her hand firmly on top of his metal fingers. “- _words_ are never gonna patch over your _massive fucking trust issues_ –”

“Yeah, no shit,” he glibbed, but she spoke louder to drown him out.

“- _So it might not matter to you_ , but I’m gonna say it. I – I want to spend the rest of my life _choosing you_ , Rick.”

Rick swallowed heavily and Morty took the fact that _for once_ he didn’t have something quippy to snap back as a good sign.

“I’m gonna keep choosing you, Rick, just like I’ve been doing since you walked into my life.” His eyes were glued to hers and she opened herself up as best as she knew how, letting him read her mind – however the fuck he did that – willing him to understand how much she meant those words.

“You can’t _know_ that, Morty,” Rick breathed, and there was something so achingly precious in that small admission that Morty wanted to shrink Rick down so she could cup him in her hands and press him into that hole in her heart. “That’s not… _Feelings can change_. They aren’t permanent or quantifiable.”

“Yeah of course. But – Rick – if they do, you’ll be the first to know. I – I’ve come this far so you know I’m stubborn and - and _selfish_ when it comes to you. If I – if my feelings _change_ , I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you as it’s happening. _You’ll know_. You can read my fucking mind anyways.”

And he was doing it then, two blown out pupils bouncing around between hers like he was reading cue cards off the back of her skull.

“But you can’t keep living your life waiting for that imaginary moment when I’ll change my mind. I don’t expect you to - to change or whatever. But I think the breadth of my feelings for you – they deserve –” ugh, maybe Ric’s conversation _had_ rubbed off on her, “- they deserve some fucking acknowledgment.”

Rick’s brow was still furrowed like he was trying to frown but his eyes were rounder than usual, lit up with something so bright, so far and away from the black holes she was so used to tumbling into, they may as well have been stars.

She watched his throat work to swallow again, adam’s apple bobbing once and then once more, before he cleared his throat roughly and gave one tilt of his chin that might have been a nod.

“Okay,” he said, his voice level and even, his eyes boring into her like he was staring right through her flesh and blood to the circuit of electrical impulses that made up her brain, reading them like code.

“Okay?” she echoed back in disbelief and Rick huffed through his nose and turned away, shaking his head at the ceiling.

“Yeah, Morty. _Okay_.”

It was right about _then_ that Morty dissolved into the truly embarrassing kind of tears that she absolutely loathed, pressing her wet eyes to Rick’s bare chest and trying to curl under his skin. She heard Rick sigh above her in a put-upon kind of way but the hand she was leaning over had somehow found its way under her shirt to stroke her stomach in an awkward attempt at comfort.

“ _And don’t die_ ,” she demanded, leaning up just in time to catch his soft, vaguely baffled look before he shuttered it behind an eye roll.

“No promises there, bud,” he shrugged and it was Morty’s turn to roll her eyes. “The general consensus is _everything_ dies eventually.”

“Then we’re going together.”

A smirk that wasn’t even remotely mean tilted up the corner of Rick’s mouth, despite his obvious attempts to keep a straight face. “That might not be so bad,” he admitted, a chuckle blowing out his nose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Stay tuned for more smut...


	23. Chapter Twenty-Three

After a minute where Rick allowed Morty to quietly sniffle against his bare shoulder – her snot and tears adding to the colletion of body fluids already painting his pale skin – he hummed out a calm, quiet sound that Morty could have melted into.

“You better not have been fucking with me when you said you don’t know how to release me, Morty,” he murmured, his voice rumbling into her ear straight from his chest. “Cause I’m starting to get pissed about this.” With a pointed tilt of his chin, he gestured, seemingly, to his entire body, and Morty leaned back and blew her bangs out of her eyes.

“I – let me look again. But _you’re_ the genius – _and_ the _Rick_ \- you got any suggestions?”

That was how Ric found them less than ten minutes later: Morty under the table running her fingers over every inch of metal for the _second_ time – just in case she’d missed something the first round - and Rick muttering curses and threats under his breath, the metal creaking as he strained to pry himself free with muscle alone.

“Damn,” Ric hummed, stepping out of a portal and crossing her bony arms. “I was really hoping you’d be a vegetable.”

“Yeah well, it’d take a lot more than a laser to destroy _my_ brain,” Rick spat while Morty crawled out from under the table, chewing on her bottom lip.

“Mom –” she started to ask, hoping to hedge the inevitable bickering.

“- Is perfectly safe and back at your house on U-694. I told her he –” Ric jerked her chin in Rick’s direction, “- got held back at a meet-up for a super rare and debilitating strain of space herpes.”

“Oh,” Morty hummed at the same time Rick muttered, ‘ _Bitch_.’ “Is that a thing?”

“Even the genitally disfigured need love, Morty,” Ric hummed, sidling over to the table and leaning her elbows next to Rick’s head, grinning down at him maniacally while he gnashed his teeth at her in a snarl. “Maybe _especially._ ”

“Yeah, wha- _aaaugh_ -tever, we get it, now do us _both_ a favor and let me up so I don’t have to think about how fucked up my face looks with a set of tits below it.”

Ric leaned back up, ignoring Rick and turning a conspiratorial smile to Morty. “He knows about the bracelet, huh?”

Morty felt her cheeks heat and she ducked her head. It really would have been better if she’d kept that a secret but lying to Rick was impossible when he could read her fucking mind.

Ric tapped a finger to her lip, half her unibrow quirking up. “If I gave you a new one, I get the feeling he’d just take it away…” she mused and Morty bit her lip. “But that’s okay, Morty, I’ll do you one better.” Ric’s hand disappeared into her pocket only to pull out – was that Morty’s phone? And _oh shit_ – the picture of Rick (and robot-Rick) _fucking her_ was still set as the background, clearly visible when Ric illuminated the screen.

Morty didn’t see Ric’s reaction, she was too busy hiding her face behind her hands and keening some sort of stressed-out/embarrassed sound from the back of her throat. “Real classy,” Ric bit out, and Morty recoiled from the tone until she peeked around her splayed fingers and realized Ric’s ire was entirely directed at Rick, who seemed to be trying to set her on fire with his mind. His arms were completely tensed against his bonds, metal screeching against metal, veins bulging under the thin skin of his flesh arm.

“T - that’s uh –” Morty stammered, trying to come up with an excuse.

“- _obviously_ his idea, Morty, I know,” Ric supplied easily, letting her searing glare linger over Rick a moment more before she swiped over to the camera app and pulled Morty into her chest.

Morty, shocked to be manhandled into the almost familiar boney embrace with the exception of two soft _breasts_ pressing into her shoulders, huffed out an awkward, uncomfortable laugh on instinct.

“Say ‘ _fuck everyone_ ’,” Ric hummed, her whiskey breath huffing against Morty’s ear.

And it was so uncanny – though not nearly as uncanny as the perfect scowl and middle fingered salute Ric shot the camera – just like the selfie of her and Rick that Morty so prized, except in this version, Morty face was frozen in a wide-eyed look of shock instead of scrunched up with laughter.

When Ric handed Morty back her phone, the new selfie had been set as her background.

“My number’s in there too,” Ric shrugged, and Morty had barely gotten over the shock of the similar-but-so-very-different picture staring her in the face that she jumped when her phone vibrated, a bubble bearing the name ‘Ric’ popping up, the message containing only the smiling shit emoji.

Morty laughed, a little panicked.

“Morty, we’re changing your number,” Rick bit out from between his teeth. He wasn’t looking at her, or at Ric for that matter, but glaring straight up at the ceiling, a muscle near the corner of his human eye twitching beneath the skin.

“What, you think I don’t have ways to figure out someone’s _phone number_?” Ric goaded, rolling her eyes and settling her hand on Morty’s head, combing out her bangs. “You can text me whenever you want, Morty, but don’t make me save this asshole again. That was a one and done deal, got it?”

Morty nodded shakily, still trying to wrap her mind around the fact that her phone now had a sixth contact. She was really moving up in the world.

“As if we’d ask _you_ for help,” Rick snapped but Ric only sighed dramatically in response.

“You were a better patient when you were dying,” she scoffed, taking a long sip from her flask and winking at Morty where Rick wouldn’t see.

Then she pulled a laser pistol from her pocket and pointed it at Rick’s forehead.

Morty’s body reacted before her brain caught up, lingering survival instincts thrown all out whack from the rollercoaster ride of the day, and she threw herself between the two Ricks, arms spread wide screeching, “ _No_ ,” in a voice so high and frantic it hurt her own ears.

“ _Relax_ , Morty,” Ric hummed, “It’s just a precaution. I won’t shoot him unless he makes me.” Keeping the pistol trained on the two of them, Ric tapped at her watch and a metallic _thunk_ behind Morty’s back told her she’d released Rick’s bonds. “So _please,_ Rick. _Make me._ ”

Morty - still not entirely sure it was a good idea to take her eyes off the barrel pointed in her direction - felt more than saw Rick sit up slowly, his arm brushing against her back. She heard him crack his neck and his carefully controlled, _angry_ breathing.

Ric, looking blasé and confident, cocked the gun.

Rick’s hand landed heavily on Morty’s shoulder as he swung his legs over the edge of the table, slidding slowly to his feet. She could feel the static charge of his ire like a live wire dragging over her skin but Morty couldn’t help but trust Ric. Hadn’t she been left alone with Rick for hours? Couldn’t she have let him bleed out on her table and come out the other end completely blameless?

Morty relaxed against Rick’s side, turning her face up only to cower slightly at the heated stare off between the two doppelgangers that practically drew a tangible line of fire across the room.

Desperate for an excuse to look away, Morty crouched to pick up the bloody pile of clothes at her feet when her eyes landed on the collar, the sight of it making something in her stomach clench uncomfortably. On autopilot, her fingers stretched out, reaching for the cold mental, but Ric snapped, “ _Leave it_ ,” and Morty startled hard enough that a few glass marble-looking-things fell out of the Rick’s lab coat pocket.

Morty glanced up, surprised by the sharpness of Ric’s tone, feeling a little like a dog who had been kicked.

“Leave it with me, Morty,” Ric repeated after carefully schooling her features into something less angry, her tone much softer. Morty scooped up the weird marbles and shoved them into what she hoped was a pocket before standing up slowly, holding out the bundle of fabric for Rick.

Rick snatched the clothes out of her hands but instead of fishing through his lab coat pockets like she’d been expecting, he dumped everything on the table and spun Morty around. Morty - who had _no_ idea what Rick was after but went loosely with his manhandling entirely on autopilot - felt the cool edge of the metal table unexpectedly on her bare ass when Rick started tugging the borrowed t-shirt over her head.

A quick glance up at Rick’s hard-lined face had her lifting her arms in compliance, sheltered by his thin, bare chest from Ric’s view, though she heard the woman sigh in an annoyed kind of way on the other side of him.

Once he’d ripped Ric’s shirt off over her head, he balled it up and dropped it on the ground, shooting Ric a smug look over his shoulder. His hand were gentler when he crammed Morty’s head through the neckline of his bloody sweater, the last view before she disappeared under the rough knit the determined flat line of his eyebrow. The fabric was stiff and wet with gore, one of the sleeves was torn off at her elbow, blood lining the tear, but besides that it smelled like vodka and gasoline and Rick’s skin and she found herself comforted despite the gun still pointed in their direction and the anger simmering barely bellow Rick’s frown.

When she emerged again, dressed (or something close to it) Rick looked a little sated, a smug grin toying around the curved tilt to his mouth, the look especially intense with Rick’s lopsided eyes.

Ric scoffed, “ _Really_?” and Morty self-consciously covered her warm cheeks with one bare hand and one that was lost to Rick’s too-long sleeve. She _really_ shouldn’t encourage possessive-Rick… it was a _bad idea_ … but it was hard not to find his grumpy obstinance endearing.

Once the hem of his sweater had settled halfway down to her knees, he turned. “Gonna send us home or what?”

Ric rolled her eyes but fished her free hand around in her pocket and pulled out her portal gun. “Don’t be a stranger, Morty,” she urged, almost flirtatiously, and Rick’s arm settled heavily over Morty’s shoulder. A portal spiraled open in the empty space next to them and Rick started steering her through it.

“Thanks again, Ric,” Morty muttered, trying to breathe the entirety of her gratefulness into words that didn’t seem nearly big enough to fit the depth of her appreciation. “ _For everything_.”

“I’ll see you around,” Ric promised, her glinting smile wiped from Morty’s sight with a film of green particles and the darkness of the garage as Rick shoved her through the portal.

After they both stepped out - the dusty, hot air of the garage coating Morty’s lungs in a way that felt like _home_ \- and the portal irised out of existence behind them, Rick barked, “ _No, we won’t_ ,” to the empty air behind them.

With a drawn out sigh, Rick scrubbed a hand through his hair and reached out a long arm to flick on the overhead light.

It wasn’t exactly that Morty had _forgotten_ what had been going on the last time she and Rick were in the garage, it was more that she had been too delirious with panic and blood loss to pay any mind to the _absolute carnage_ they’d left on the floor.

It was easy to follow the path of her frantic scrambling: the most sizable pool of blood was disturbed by a trail that splattered towards the door, dripped to the shelf of upended inventions, and finally smeared over to the portal gun where it lay side-up on the ground, the handle still caked with gore.

Rick surveyed the scene silently. He looked right at home in the mess, shirtless still and covered with blood and blue viscera, one skeletal burnished metal arm hanging at his side. Morty had to fiercely remind herself that she should ignore the spike of heat the sight of him inspired in her core - that she shouldn’t be wildly, _inappropriately_ turned on by minute clench of silver fingers or the shift of sharp shoulder blades under red-smeared skin – not when he was so recently brought back from the brink of death.

But his appeal was ( _as always_ ) hard to ignore. It didn’t help that he was clearly furious – a type of furious Morty had never seen before, it was so unlike him to keep silent – and his anger triggered a strange live-wire of dread and excitement that coiled all the way down her spine.

But now wasn’t the right time for that. Mom was probably worried about them and Rick probably should do something about his skinless arm and Morty needed to process – needed to cope with the fact that _Rick loved her_. And her euphoria made a bad match for his obvious low burning rage.

When he kept still and quiet nearly a whole minute, Morty started to worry that maybe she had broken something _really_ important when she’d thrown half his abandoned inventions off the shelf but he spoke up before she could formulate a stammered aplogy.

“We should go get the ship, Morty,” he said, face turned away from her, his voice hard to read. He dropped the pile of bloody clothes on his workbench and kicked open a drawer, pulling a bottle of vodka out and chugging half of it in one long pull.

“Oh – okay,” Morty almost whispered, not at all accustom to him being so tight lipped.

By now he should be ranting about how she shouldn’t have dragged his ass to Ric for help, or maybe backtracking over his almost-confession, or even reaming her about how it was _her_ fault he got shot in the first place. That was what _she_ was thinking about, blinking around at the garage and trying not to dwell too long on what she would have done if Rick’s secret robot eye hadn’t shielded his stupid, precious brain from a laser meant for _her_ face.

He fiddled with the dial and shot a portal, gesturing with the swipe of his robotic hand for her to lead the way.

Morty obeyed his silent command, fighting down the urge to peer up into his face, trying to give him the emotional distance he clearly needed to deal with… _whatever_ it was he was thinking so hard about. But it was hard when a massive part of her wanted to grab him by the ears and scream ‘ _you love me!_ ’ and ‘ _thank fuck you’re alive!_ ’ on an endless loop until she passed out.

After the pet convention and the garage and Ric’s sunset-red apartment, it was a little surreal to step back out into the clean, narrow alley where they’d left Hyperion nearly ten hours ago. She wondered if maybe they should have washed up a bit or something, Rick was filthy and shirtless while she was barefoot and wearing a sweater more blood than yarn.

But it was dark and Morty had clean run out of fucks to give. So what if they looked ridiculous and out of place on the sterile streets of a quiet neighborhood? They were on a hospital planet. In theory folks around here should be a bit more used to blood and guts.

The last time she’d leaned back and peered up at the thin strip of sky visible between the two towering buildings, it had been full of sunshine and she’d been furious with Rick and twisted up in knots over her dad.

Now the big tangle of worry she’d been harboring _for months_ had finally been unwound, the dead weight at the center put to rest in a deep grave. And she was so stupidly overjoyed that Rick wasn’t hurt ( _and that he_ loved _her_ ) that it was hard to imagine being mad at him ever again - even though objectively she knew damn well it would probably only be a matter of hours before he was getting on her nerves again.

She had only paused for half a second, tilting her chin back to see what the constellations looked like from this galaxy, when she felt Rick stir the back of her ( _his_ ) sweater, her elbow suddenly caught up in a tight metal grip and leveraged until she spun around.

His mouth was on her instantaneously, sucking and nibbling at her lower lip and pulling a startled moan from the depths of her lungs. With one hard shove, he had her pinned against the alley wall, hands on her hips lifting her up, her legs spreading automatically to wrap around his waist.

“ _Morty_ ,” he breathed against her neck, the stir of warm air making her shiver. She opened her eyes to find him peering at her closely with his uneven gaze, the robotic eye surrounded by metal parts and blinking lights. His face was smeared with blood – his and those awful creature’s - but she leaned in and crushed her face to his, desperate to close every inch of space between them until they merged into one.

His flesh arm wrapped itself around her waist, dragging her down onto the bulge already tenting his pants, the rough fabric scrapping against her bare lips in a way that should have been painful but only made her desperate for more. Something cold touched her cheek – his metal hand, she realized a moment later when she pulled back to catch her breath and her brain had enough free room to think – the cool steel impossibly gentle where he curved his palm along her jaw line and dragged her back in for another kiss.

He kissed her like he _meant_ it, and for one topsy-turvy moment, Morty pulled back her head and laughed - _really_ laughed - giving way to the delight that had been threatening to pour out of her since Rick had tersely bit out ‘ _don’t let it go to your head_ ’. Because honestly, _how the fuck could it not_?

_Rick Sanchez_ loved _her_. He _loved_ her. Some twisted, malformed part of him that couldn’t be torn out – the _human_ part that he hated more than anything but Morty so adored – loved her.

“What’s so funny, Morty,” Rick growled against her exposed neck, licking a stripe up the side of her throat. Her laughter hitched into a moan when the cool night air made the lingering line of saliva tingle.

“I just –” Morty started, rolling her hips when Rick’s fleshy hand dropped to her butt and squeezed. “- I’m just _happy_ , Rick,” she admitted, another dazed chuckle finding its way past her lips while she nudged her nose along the sharp curve of his cheekbone.

“You’re a weird kid,” Rick grumbled, but he was chuckling too, the stubbled cheek she pressed her mouth to tight with a smile. When he leaned back, both hands holding her up with a grip on her hips, she didn’t miss the way he let his nose slot along hers in an affectionate rub that nearly split her face with a grin.

Then he dropped her, her legs barely swinging down to catch her in time. “Race you to the ship,” he whispered into the shell of her ear, and her body swayed when he pulled away chasing after the missing warmth.

She ran after him – just like she always did, always _always_ chasing after him – but she was faster now than she had been when he walked into her life two years ago and it wasn’t so hard to keep pace. His crooked grin flashed at her under the light of two moons as they turned a corner and nearly bowled over a late night pedestrian, but Rick’s hand was on her wrist and her bare feet were eating up the pavement before the poor civilian had a chance to start shouting after them.

They slapped their hands on the roof of the ship at _almost_ exactly the same time, Rick crowing his victory loud enough that a few of the dark apartments above them flickered on their lights, and he was still laughing when he shoved her into the passenger seat, crawling in after her and _over her_ until he was behind the wheel and they were careening up through the atmosphere.

Once they were safely ensconced in the blackness of space, Rick flipped on the autopilot, his glowing eyes flicking up to her suggestively.

“We’ve got a couple hours to kill, _Moooorty_ ,” he said, pale chest lit up by the console lights and the sea of flickering stars on the other side of the glass.

“O – oh, is that so, Rick?” she answered in the best imitation of coyness her awkward ass could manage, playing along with his little game, _thrilled_ to see him flushed with life and – it didn’t seem right; when she’d met him so long ago she might have even thought it was impossible but – he seemed _happy_ too. Actually happy.

Not _one-of-my-enemies-conveniently-expired_ smug or _just-found-a-new-stash-of-kalaxian_ - _crystals_ giddy or even _drunk-off-his-ass-and-borderline-manic_ excited but real, actual happiness.

He was smiling, and it wasn’t _exactly_ soft but it was about the closest thing he ever got and Morty ached for him.

“Wha- _aaugh-_ t’ll we do with all that time?” he drolled, leaning back and lacing his finger behind his head, the silver streak of his artificial eye glinting blue as the ship sped past a planet covered in frost.

“I – I dunno, Rick, I guess…” Morty stammered, smiling as she crawled across the space between their seats and onto his lap, shoving up his armrest to make space for her knee next to his hip. She was wracking her brain, tying to work out something witty to say, but all she could think about was how good Rick’s bare skin felt against the inside of her thighs. “I guess we could...” she trailed off with a frustrated sigh. “Rick, I’m too fucking horny to be clever – can we just get naked?”

Rick laughed, the sound deep and surprised, while Morty shoved her hands between them and got to work unbuckling his belt.

It had been so long since she’d gotten off – not since ( _jeezus_ ) the threesome with robot-Rick – and even though that had been good ( _very good_ ), it wasn’t the same as the peace and exultation of having Rick inside of her – working each other up until the world narrowed to just the two of them.

“I don’t hate your impatience, bud,” he admitted, his chest still rumbling with chuckles. “Here, I’ll help.”

She managed to unbuckle, unbutton, and unzip his fly before he dragged his sweater over her face again, shucking it off and tossing it into the passenger seat while she lifted onto her knees enough to start dragging his pants down. He raised his hips and kicked off his shoes and socks and in record time, they were both completely bare.

His skin against hers was _divine_ and Morty plastered herself to him, burying her face against his neck and breathing in the smell of his skin and sweat. His fingers traced lightly over the skin of her back, the metal hand leaving a cool trail along her heated flesh only minimally chillier than his human hand.

“Can you – can you feel stuff with that?” she asked, the thought rearing its head before Morty considered the potential tactlessness of that sort of question.

“Yeah,” Rick rumbled above her, the metal hand trailing the backs of its fingers down her arm. “Why, you weirded out?”

She leaned back, already shaking her head. “No,” she frowned, running her fingers over the place his skin shifted to metal. Ric must have done something, a temporary fix probably, sloppily cinching the skin around the thinner metal rod with a few rough stitches. The skin looked pink and angry. “Does it hurt?” She gave into the urge to run her hand along the metal bar of his upper arm, stalling over the decidedly mechanical joint that functioned as his elbow but looked nothing like anything found in a human body.

“Not much, anymore,” he admitted, leaning over and fishing around under the passenger seat with his flesh arm until he found a bottle of liquor and titled it to his lips. The ship filled with the smell of whiskey – with the smell of _Rick_ – and Morty squirmed, biting down hard on her bottom lip.

“So you can feel this?” she asked, running her nail gently along his metal forearm, scraping away a stripe of dried blood to reveal burnished steel underneath.

“It’s different,” Rick shrugged, lifting the bottle to his lips again and surveying her with half-lidded eyes. “Ones and zeros, Morty, straight to my brain. Registers measurable sensation: pressure, texture, temperature. Not pain or –” Morty lifted the metal hand and brought it to her face, using his robotic fingers to trace the wet plush of her bottom lip. “- _pleasure_ ,” he finished after a long pause.

“Still ones and zeros?” she wondered, licking at the tip of his metal thumb.

“ _Fuck_ , Morty,” he breathed, his pupils dilating.

The loud thunk of glass against metal told her he’d dropped the bottle of whiskey and then two mismatched hands were sliding up her stomach, their touch light and barely-there. They left a trail of goosebumps in their wake and Morty slid her eyes closed when they each circled a breast.

“What –” she broke off to groan, soft and low from the back of her throat, “What happened to robot-Morty?” she asked, the thought drifting into her mind unannounced.

“Why are you thinking about that?” Rick demanded, his fingers squeezing her breasts until she keened, the pressure almost too much but so very good. After half a moment he released her, his fingers gentle again while they plucked at her nipples until they hardened.

“She hasn’t been going to school,” Morty breathed, slotting her eyes open in time to catch the frown dipping what was left of Rick’s unibrow into a V.

When his eyes dragged up to survey her skeptically, Morty realized she was right to be curious. There was something there – something Rick didn’t want to tell her – something he’d probably keep from her by some sort of distraction…

“Rick-bot and Morty-bot split,” he answered flatly, surprising the shit out of Morty with his candor. His hands dragged down to her waist where he shifted her hips until his warm, hard cock slid between her lips when she rocked against him. A rush of moisture leaked from her fold, the sensation _absolute heaven_ after so long without a way to get herself off.

Rick looked similarly wrecked, his eyes bright when they swiveled from the red tip of his dick nudging at her clit to her flushed face.

“They – they can _do that_?” Morty asked, dragging her mind back to Rick’s unexpected answer. “I thought he – I thought robot-Rick had – I dunno – _programming_ or something to keep him around.”

“ _He did_ ,” Rick admitted, the heat of him between her legs searing. “He found a way around it, Morty – worked out a loophole. Took Morty-bot and bailed.”

“ _Holy shit,_ ” she breathed, both at the feel of him nudging against her opening and the surprise of finding out robot-Rick had out-maneuvered Rick. But… she was kind of happy he had. No Rick should be cooped up like that – forced to follow orders. It was… she laughed a little breathily to herself… ‘ _a perversion of the natural order_ ’ to leave a Rick in bondage.

And he took his Morty with him. Because he loved her too. ‘ _Perfect replicas_ ’ he’d said. She shivered, half in happiness and half in pleasure when Rick reached between them and angled his cock to nudge against her entrance.

“Is that what we’re gonna do, Rick?” she wondered aloud, thinking of the real estate agent coming the next day and the apartments they’d spent the morning looking at for mom and the future that she was a little more certain they’d spend together.

“Is that what you _want_ to do?” Rick growled, his hands a vice where they pushed down on her hips, impaling her onto him one swift push.

Morty moaned, the sound lewd and uninhibited where it bounced against the stars. For one breathless moment he held still, letting her shift and adjust to the stretch of penetration, letting her center herself around him like he was the one sacred truth in all the universe because _he was_.

“I – I think so,” she conceded, the realization big and horrible but also painfully liberating to finally say out loud. That was what she wanted – just her and Rick and the multiverse. And knowing that Rick loved her made it so much easier to say.

Rick rolled his hips up under her, the motion jerky and uncoordinated, and Morty rolled her eyes from the back of her head to see him gaping up at her with faint surprise. “ _Really_ , Morty, that’s what you want?”

Talking to him had never been so easy. “Not like – I mean I don’t want to cut off mom and Summer forever,” Morty carefully added, her breath coming heavy when Rick started pulling her into him with a slow, torturous rhythm, his thrusts deep but short. “We’d probably need to check up on them sometimes…”

Rick grunted, the sound torn from his throat.

“But someplace just for us – or maybe _everywhere_ – just the two of us…” Rick’s eyes were electric-bright, boring into her like she was the center of a nuclear blast. His arms wrapped around her hips to hold her steady as his slow thrusting grew in force, her breath punched out of her with every stroke. “Is - is that bad?”

“No, Morty,” he breathed, a smile just teasing at the corners of his mouth. “My precious girl. That’s fucking perfect, bud. Grandpa can give that to you, Morty…” He pushed up, his torso bowing over her, laving at her nipple with a broad tongue.

She leaned back, arching herself into his ministrations, bracing herself against the steering wheel – thank fuck for autopilot. She tilted her head back just as the ship careened past the smashed remains of a huge battleship, the torn open hull frozen forever spilling out debris. It was ghostly and haunting but also _incredible_ , smaller ships stalled out in its periphery making it easy to imagine the firefight that must have happened there however long ago, where it would be played out endlessly – stuck like that as time ticked on until the universe expanded around it.

“ _Morty_ ,” Rick growled, and it was hard to tear her eyes away from the sight, even when the slow strokes inside of her turned almost lazy. “ _Look at me_ , Morty.”

Her eyes dropped down to him – to the flush that dusted his cheeks and warmed his chest, to the his slightly crooked teeth flashing at her in a smirk, to the warm glint in his eyes.

“ _You’re_ incredible, Rick,” she said, realizing a moment later she had been answering a thought in her own head, not something she’d said aloud. But she’d never told him anything like that before - not during sex. He was the one who always sweet talked her and she – well she was always too self-conscious to do too much talking and Rick hardly needed the encouragement.

That thought process was proven right when Rick’s grin turned cocky and he rolled up into her with renewed force. “Oh yeah, Morty? You like what I do to you?”

He grabbed her around the waist and twisted with her in his lap, pushing her into the backseat. His long arm reached over and pulled up the lever on the backrest and they toppled over as the seat reclined into one big, flat cushion.

With his hand around her waist, he dragged her with him as he climbed over her, her legs around his waist keeping him locked inside of her the entire time. When they settled - slightly sideways but mostly on the seat - his knees had enough leverage to pull all the way out of her before thrusting back in – the slide intoxicating.

Pleasure zinged along her spine and Rick’s face – one unblinking eye surrounded by glinting metal - butted up against the endless expanse of space, the heat of his stare brighter than the burning stars over his shoulders.

“I like it all,” Morty breathed, spreading her legs, hand scrabbling the side panel of the ship for something to hold onto when his thrusting turned wild. “I like _you_.”

A wild, sincere laugh burbled out of Rick at the admission and he pressed a mouthy kiss to her knee. Even when his human eye squinted closed, the artificial eye rimmed with metal stayed swiveled in her direction, glued on her with a focus that should have been unnerving but only amped her up higher.

_He loves me_ , her brain argued, an endless mantra in her head that was setting her on fire from the inside out, blood rushing to the place their bodies met. _He loves me he loves me he loves me._

“You’re thinking about it, aren’t you, Morty,” he growled, that lidless eye staring into her very soul, the other narrowed slightly in suspicion.

“Oh, yeah,” Morty admitted shamelessly. “I’m – I’m definitely thinking about it, Rick.”

His thrusts turned rough and unforgiving, the wide rolling jerk of his hips dragging his cock from the deepest point it penetrated to almost entirely out of her channel, the head nudging at her entrance with every forward motion. “I told you not to let it go to your head,” he bit out, but the words lacked ire. Instead, he was boring down at her with the most open look of wonder and adoration she’d ever seen on his face. It made him look younger and happier and impossibly handsome, and her heart burst for him but that was okay because he was _hers_.

She tried not to, really, but the options were smile or sob so she let her lips curve up into something a little teary-er than she intended. “ _You love me_ ,” she said breathily, the words neither taunting nor demanding nor gloating. They were simply stated because they were _true_.

She watched a star swirl around the black holes in his eyes, skirting the edge of oblivion but too bright to give up its hold. “ _Morty_ ,” he whispered, his fingers knotting in her hair and dragging her mouth to his, swallowing her moan with his tongue.

She came like that, his arms around her waist and plastering her to his chest like he wanted some hapless explorer to stumble upon their fused bodies a millennia from now. Her toes curled and every muscle in her body clenched and she wanted to remember this moment forever – to keep it inside her like a burning torch to carry through the dark.

Rick rocked her through her orgasm and when she finally came back to herself enough to focus her eyes on Rick’s too-intense stare, whatever was written across her face – her devotion, her adoration, the promise of their life spiraling ahead of them _together_ – sent him groaning over the edge, his hips jerking spastically as his human eye clenched shut and his artificial one swiveled to stay locked on her.

After a moment where they both struggled to catch their breath - his cheek pressed to her sternum while her fingers carded through his hair, Rick’s chest rumbled with laughter and he pulled out of her with a grimace, rolling over to spread out beside her, his arm shoved under her neck like a pillow.

Stars were still careening past them on the other side of the glass, the sight beautiful and calming and exhilarating all at once. When Rick’s lips pressed against her temple, the touch firm and sure and grounding, Morty realized she’d been smiling for so long her wet cheeks hurt.

“I love you too, Rick,” she whispered to the stars.

“Yeah, Morty,” Rick rumbled back, curling his arm around her shoulder until she rolled into his chest. “ _I know_.”

 

* * *

 

The front door was open, sunlight pouring into the empty foyer of the Smith house, the first hints of autumn making the breeze that wafted over Morty’s skin just _hint_ at the possibility of a cooler future.

Not that Morty would be around to watch the leaves fall off the trees or join the throng of students milling back into the high school next week.

Summer had already come and gone, dashing up the stairs in a leather get-up that belonged in a dystopian 80’s movie, a rifle slung over her back. Morty had thought it might be tactful to let her sister make peace with her childhood bedroom alone but it was less than ten minutes before Summer careened back down the steps with one box tucked under her arm, slinging back a ‘ _you can toss everything else_ ’ before she was out the door again.

Blue Meeseeks bustled past Morty where she stood in the entry way, eyes closed to better feel the gentle breeze ruffling her hair, to better smell the grassy, wet smell of their lawn, her fingers tracing over the scorch mark burned into the wall at the base of the stairs.

A moving ship was parked in the driveway – not that mom was taking much with her to the apartment Rick had found on Hyperion. She had developed a lasting grudge against most of the furniture in the house – expressing more than once that she planned to start from scratch in her new life – and so the Meeseeks were mostly tossing random collections of junk into a portal to a garbage dimension Rick had left open in the living room. Morty had peeked her head through for a half a second in curiosity before recoiling, very grateful _smells_ couldn’t travel through the thin film of particles.

Morty’s stuff was already packed and stored in the backseat of Rick’s ship. She wasn’t bringing much. Clothing. Soap and a toothbrush. Some food from the kitchen. Her laptop. The pistol Rick had made for her. She’d gotten very used to living without much – between the bunker and adventures that unexpectedly turned into week long affairs, packing light had become second nature.

Besides, anything else she needed, Rick could make or steal or buy.

And she still wasn’t really sure what their plan was anyways. She suspected they’d be living out of the ship for a little while – until Rick found someplace he liked or they stumbled upon some new scheme or they got sick of sleeping in the backseat.

The house hadn’t sold yet but mom started classes in a week and was anxious to move onto the next part of her life. Rick had promised to handle the eventual sale – and it had to be _him_ now doing all the mundane shit he so hated since robot-Rick was still MIA with his Morty – so Morty suspected she’d see the house one more time when he handed over the keys and the finalized paperwork but this felt like goodbye.

The living room had already been emptied out - mostly only mom’s collection of books made it into the moving ship and Rick had taken the TV. Everything else was chucked into the portal with a briskness that bordered on cruelty but Morty was trying not to think about that.

She paced around the portal into the kitchen, lingering against the wall while she watched mom point out things to a clipboard-bearing Meeseeks deciding their fate.

“Toss,” she instructed, pointing at the fridge. “Jerry picked these out so _definitely_ toss,” she said, gesturing to a stack of plates. “Pack,” she ordered, talking to the shelf filled with wine glasses and cups.

Mom had yet to ask about Rick’s plans with Morty – or if she had, she hadn’t done so in Morty’s presence. Morty wondered whether Rick had lied about her going to school or if mom had essentially stopped worrying about Morty’s education the moment Rick walked into the house. Whatever the case, Morty was mostly happy she wouldn’t have to set foot back inside Harry Herpson High School. _Mostly_. Just like with the packing, that thought came with a slightly bitter edge.

Mom brushed past her into the hallway and Morty leaned against the counter and watched two Meeseeks heft the fridge up and carry it out of the room.

Morty’s phone buzzed in her pocket and she frowned, pulling it out and chewing on her lip as she considered the little notification bearing Jessica’s name before she swiped her phone open with a drawn out sigh.

Jessica had sent her two texts, probably both immediately after Morty’s last text, and looking at them made Morty feel like Jessica deserved more from her than a long, weirdly emotional unloading.

_Jessica: Morty, this sounds like a goodbye? (7:42 pm)_

_Jessica: Are you sure you’re okay? Do you want to talk about it? (7:73 pm)_

Morty had stared at them intermittently over the last few days but she hadn’t worked up the courage to respond. She mostly expected Jessica’s newest message to be something along the lines of ‘ _fine then, be a stupid bitch_ ,’ cause that was exactly what Morty felt like, but her eyes swept over the text and her breath caught in her throat.

_Jessica: I saw the for sale sign in front of your house today. So I guess that last message really was goodbye._

_I always knew you had a crush on me. You’re not exactly subtle, Morty, but I figured I’d let you take the lead. You’ve always been better at being different, at being yourself. You make it look easy but I know it’s not._

_I hope you and Rick have nothing but good adventures. (1:02 pm)_

The last tight wire of guilt that had been squeezing Morty’s heart unwound and Morty stared down at her phone with watery eyes for long enough that by the time she looked up, the kitchen had been completely emptied.

It was insane how wrong Jessica had read Morty – Morty wasn’t _good_ at being different. She just… was. And she had never once thought it was a good thing. Except…

Except if she was _normal_ , maybe she wouldn’t be with Rick. Maybe she wouldn’t be dropping out of school to travel the multiverse. Maybe she wouldn’t be standing on the brink of the unknown completely ready to throw herself over the ledge.

And Rick was different too, wasn’t he? Strange and ridiculous and not always easily digestible but absolutely her favorite person in existence. So maybe different _wasn’t_ bad.

Morty swiped at the wet corners of her eyes and tucked her phone away, drifting through the kitchen and into the garage where she found Rick hunched over a bare work table. He had already stored the shit he didn’t want to leave behind in a pocket universe tucked neatly under the front seat - his better inventions and his vast collection of tools and weapons and his nice bed that Morty suspected they’d both be missing in less than a week. The ship was cramped after all. But damn, it had the best view in the multiverse.

He glanced up when she walked in and the smile that curved up his mouth had a little less of the meanness that used to lingering around the corners of his lips.

“All set, bud?” he asked, his eyes raking over her. They darted to the toe she kept scuffing against the cement floor and the arms hugged tight around her chest and the lip she was worrying between her teeth. He slotted his hand on his hips, his brow dipping in a V. “You good?”

Morty glanced around the empty garage. At the cork board that used to bear all his tools, at the shelf that was once covered in inventions, at the seamless place Rick had paved over the entrance to his bunker.

She shrugged.

“Second thoughts?” Rick rasped, his eyes narrowing. He’d fixed his face and his arm – the skin returned to normal, no remaining hint that anything below his skin wasn’t human except for that silver glint in his eye.

It sparkled at her then, just a hint of insecurity bleeding through it, and Morty thought to herself how much she loved that little secret glint only she knew about.

“Nope,” she answered, unsticking her dry lip from between her teeth to pop the ‘p’. She padded over and wrapped her arms around his waist, his hand settling around her shoulders comfortably. “I can be sad and – you know, a little nostalgic without changing my mind.”

Something in Rick’s back loosened and he chuckled, running his hand over her head in a sloppy pet. “Fa- _aaugh_ -ir enough,” he burped, swinging a bottle up to his lips while he steered her into the driveway and squinted at the sun. “If that’s the case, soak it up, Morty.”

And she did. She titled her head back and let earth’s yellow sun warm her cheeks, one arm still wrapped around Rick’s waist. A Meeseeks bustled past them, wheeling a dolly loaded with a stack of boxes marked ‘ _kitchen_ ’ into the van before he poofed out of existence in a puff of blue clouds.

“Oh, looks like Beth’s almost done,” Rick said, and the two them watched as another Meeseeks dropped a stack of chairs into the moving ship and vanished in a happy burst of smoke.

“We’ll go with her, right?” Morty asked, still worried about mom despite herself. Mom was smiling a lot more, and seemed very enthusiastic to live on her own again, but the part of Morty that remembered finding Summer in the bathroom holding mom’s hair back as she puked all over herself couldn’t stop rearing it’s ugly head. “To help her get her moved in and settled?”

“’Course, Morty,” Rick promised, taking another long sip from his bottle. “Fi- _eeugh-_ rst stop Andromeda, next stop…”

Morty glanced up, waiting for Rick to finish his sentence but he only chuckled a little to himself, turning down to smile at her with a contagious grin.

“Next stop: anywhere you fucking want, baby.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There you have it.
> 
> For all the wonderful comments, for all the kudos and bookmarks, and to all those who made it to the very end - THANK YOU! As previously mentioned, I've got a few one-shot follow ups planned so keep an eye out for more in the U-694verse (if you can possibly imagine ingesting any more of this).
> 
> And most of all, thank you so _so_ much for reading! 
> 
> Love forever, whyamilike_this =^.ᆺ.^=


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